


The Face of All the World Is Changed

by Teacandles



Category: X-Men: First Class (2011) - Fandom
Genre: Beach Divorce, Gen, Headaches & Migraines, Loss of Powers, Telepathy
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-02-15
Updated: 2014-09-08
Packaged: 2018-01-12 11:21:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 4
Words: 26,382
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1185644
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Teacandles/pseuds/Teacandles
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Something is wrong with Charles. His telepathy grows weaker and weaker as their meeting Shaw draws ever closer, and Erik must cope with the reality that his friend may not be as strong as he'd once thought.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Started a _long_ time ago for a [prompt](http://1stclass-kink.livejournal.com/7315.html?thread=11816339#t11816339) on the old kink meme. (Yeah, that's how long I've been sitting on this.) It's one I've always wanted to finish, and, seeing as how I randomly pulled it out today and wrote another 5000 words for it when I've barely written anything at all for the past month, I'd say it's long past due. Some dialogue has been taken directly from the 2011 film, but not much. Also a warning for some very minor but period appropriate racism in this first part.

Erik shifted the bag around in his hands as he climbed the steps leading up to their room. Curse mutants hiding out in the middle of nowhere. Curse cheap hotels with creaky, unstable floorboards that could collapse underneath him at any time. Curse this miserable heat. And curse Charles and his stupid charisma for goading him into sticking with this ridiculous mission.

He could feel sweat clinging to his back as he made his way down the hall, making the fabric of his shirt stick uncomfortably to his skin with every step he took. The heat was damn near unbearable in this place, and he couldn’t wait until they were free of it. How people managed to live here, he had no idea, but he’d lived through worse discomforts. Much worse.

The brass numbers on the door marking their room were dull with age, leering at him like some sort of challenge. He glared back, unlocking the door with little more than a flick of his fingers, room key be damned. He’d been living in Virginia for too long. The heat was starting to get to him, and it was unacceptable. He kicked the door shut behind him.

“Charles, I brought the…” He trailed off as he examined the room. It wasn’t much different than before he’d left to grab a quick dinner for the both of them, but he hadn’t expected the place to be so _dark._ He frowned and turned on the light, his attention focused on the man seated at the small table in the corner with his head in his hands. There was no muttered hello, no wave of his hand. Nothing. Charles hadn’t even looked up to greet him. Odd, that.

He stalked over to the table, his frown deepening with every step. Erik had had the courtesy of going out and fetching some dinner for the both of them, and yet here Charles was, sitting alone in the dark without even bothering to turn on the fan. It was almost as stifling inside the room as it was out.

He flung himself into the empty chair across from Charles and dropped the grocery bag onto the scuffed wooden tabletop with a heavy thunk. Charles visibly winced at the noise, and when he looked up, Erik’s resolve softened. The man looked awful, and he was cradling his head in his hands as though it were something precious that had just caught fire—too painful to handle, but too valuable to let go. Waves of foreign thoughts and feelings were washing over Erik like water lapping up against a shore, and he scooted his chair back a little from the table, hoping the added distance would help alleviate Charles’s thoughts pressing down on his mind.

“H’lo, Erik,” Charles mumbled into his hands. He couldn’t look at Erik or face the bright lights of the room anymore, instead choosing to grind his face harder into the palms of his hands, as though the added pressure might lessen the ache in his skull.

“Headache?” Stupid question. Of course it was a headache, and it looked to be a bad one at that. He simply couldn’t think of anything else to say.

Charles grunted in response. He didn’t trust himself to raise his head, and the sound of his own voice was grating to his ears, far too loud and echoing for far too long after the words had left his lips. He didn’t trust himself to even attempt telepathic communication.

Erik sighed and pushed himself from his seat, trudging past his ailing friend to the bathroom. He knew that Charles always kept some painkillers in his toiletry bag. He rifled through the thing, shifting aside a small bottle of shampoo and Charles’s razor to find the little rattling bottle of white pills. They probably wouldn’t do much, but it was something. One of the little complementary glass cups beside the sink was quickly filled with tap water.

He walked back over to the table and placed the little bottle of pills and the water in front of Charles. The man actually looked up this time. His whites of his eyes were tinged with red, the skin around them darkened like the man hadn’t slept in a week. “Drink.” Erik nudged the glass a little closer to Charles with his hand and then made his way back to his seat, his eyes fixed on the professor.

Charles just looked at the water, the pills on the table in front of him, before lifting his gaze to Erik. “What—”

“Don’t start. Just take the damn pills. I can hear your thoughts from here.” Erik folded his arms in front of his chest. He wasn’t going to take no for an answer on this. They were in the middle of nowhere, after a mutant that, for all they knew, was long gone from here. This wasn’t the first time this particular mutant had evaded them, even in the short amount of time they had been on the hunt for more soldiers to add to their meager rough-and-tumble army, and Erik needed Charles in top-notch condition to find him.

Charles reached forward and unscrewed the cap on the bottle, tapping out a couple of little white pills into his cupped palm. Erik reached across the table for the paper bag holding their dinner, fishing out the twin packages inside. He slid one over to Charles and began unwrapping his own, eager for his sandwich but careful to make as little noise as possible. He could feel Charles’s pain surge with every crinkle of the paper in his hands but schooled his features into stone. Charles didn’t need to know that he was projecting.

“I got you the turkey. You weren’t very clear about what you wanted when I left.” Talking might help keep the man out of his head. If his control was bad enough for him to be projecting, there was no way for Erik to know that Charles wasn’t inadvertently rifling through his thoughts.

“That’s fine,” Charles replied, reaching forward for his sandwich. “I’ve never been terribly picky.”

“Mmm,” Erik grumbled around the mouthful of food in his cheek. The deli hadn’t exactly been the most respectable establishment, but he had to admit that they could make a pretty damn good sandwich. Now, if only he could manage to get rid of this heat. He eyed the fan in the corner before turning his attention back to Charles. He swallowed and lowered the food in his hands. Charles was gingerly picking at his sandwich. He hadn’t even taken a bite. “Not hungry?”

He startled and looked up, wincing as he did. Moved too fast. “What?”

Erik nodded toward the sandwich resting on the table. “Not hungry? You’ve barely touched that.”

Charles sighed and pulled off a little bit of bread from the corner. “Not particularly, but you went through the trouble of getting this for me, and it won’t last long in this heat.”

Erik nodded and cast another glance at the fan. “Are you feeling any better?”

“Yes, the medication has made this more manageable.”

Erik tilted his head toward the fan. “Then do you mind if I turn that on? You seem rather sensitive to sound at the moment, and I’d rather not experience your headache tonight while I sleep.”

Charles lowered his head into his hand again, rubbing his fingers along the temple. “Yes, I think I’ll be fine. The heat will probably aggravate things more than the noise anyway.”

Erik nodded once more and waved his fingers toward the fan. The little metal switch at its base rose, and the machine’s buzzing filled the air. His eyes never left Charles, who was still picking at his sandwich like a moody child. He let out a heavy sigh. “You need to eat something, Charles. You’re no good to me if you can’t function. I can’t pick out this mutant on my own.”

Charles didn’t answer. He simply popped the bit of bread in his fingers into his mouth and slowly began to chew. Erik turned back to his own sandwich, trying desperately to ignore the subtle waves of pain and discomfort that were still leaking over from Charles to him, instead focusing on the beads of sweat that were resting uncomfortably in the curve of the small of his back and the feel of the bread and meat in his mouth.

It was going to be a long night.

\---

Erik wasn’t sure if it was the sound or the smell that got to him first. He jolted awake, his stomach reeling with the sudden motion, and he took in his surroundings. The dingy walls of the hotel greeted him, and he flopped back down onto his lumpy pillow with a sigh of relief and frustration. Relief that he was somewhere even vaguely familiar, that Charles was in the other bed not ten feet away. Frustration that he was still _here_ of all places. And it was still damnably hot.

The sound came again, a choking and wet sort of coughing, and he looked over to his left. Huh. He’d been wrong. Charles wasn’t in bed like he’d thought. The other man was in the bathroom, sounding very much like he was vomiting what little he’d had to eat recently, or at the very least trying to bring something up. The distinct acidic smell of vomit that burned at the edges of his senses confirmed this theory. Something had definitely come up while Charles had been in there.

Erik flung an arm over his eyes and tried to focus on the soft buzz of the fan in the corner. Charles was sick. On their mission. And he was the only one who could find the asshole who’d decided to make somewhere as awful as this his hiding place. It was just his luck.

He tried to let the dark wash over him, to let sleep overtake him once more, but he couldn’t get his mind to slow. He removed his arm and stared up at the blank ceiling above him. There was a stain hovering over the end of his bed, and he grimaced. There was no telling what that was.

The hard edge of an old spring in the mattress beneath him jutted painfully into his side. He shifted it with little more than a thought. Charles was still coughing and sputtering in the bathroom; the fan buzzed softly in the background. Erik sat up once more and flung the thin sheet covering his legs to the side. He couldn’t take this anymore. He needed to calm down, relax, find something to do besides lie there and listen to his companion vomiting up everything he’d eaten this past week. He desperately needed a smoke. And that meant braving the bathroom. Fantastic.

He pushed himself up off his bed and shuffled over to the tiny bathroom, his feet catching on the thin, fraying carpet covering the floor. The door was just barely open, and the lights were off inside. He slowly pushed the door inward, not sure exactly where Charles was situated inside. As frustrated as he was with their situation, he didn’t want to somehow hit Charles on his quest for cigarettes. That would probably just end up making things worse.

When it was open enough for him to get his head through with minimal difficulty, he peered inside and grimaced as the smell hit him full force. From the moonlight seeping in through the window above the shower he could make out the faint outline of Charles hunched over the toilet, his hands gripping the porcelain rim like his life depended on it. His hair was dangling in sweaty clumps off his forehead, shifting about with his every ragged, panting breath.

Erik sighed. This was not what he’d had in mind when he’d agreed to stick around for this.

“Hello, Erik,” Charles mumbled, turning slightly to grace him with a quick, pained smile. “Lovely night we’re having.”

“Says the man with his head in the crapper.” Erik wormed his way inside, careful to avoid Charles’s legs.

“Yes, well I—” Charles suddenly went white as a sheet and turned back to the toilet, coughing up stringy bits of bile and saliva. When the bout passed, he leaned forward so that his forehead rested against the tank. His eyes were wet, and his chest was heaving. “Damn.”

Erik quickly found his cigarettes but couldn’t find it in him to leave just yet. Not when Charles looked like that. He could feel the man’s presence dancing on the edges of his mind, far more muddled than earlier that evening but there nonetheless. At least he wasn’t projecting anymore. Erik leaned back against the counter, his slightly crumpled package of cigarettes clutched loosely in his hand. “Anything I can do?”

“Probably not. Unless you have some sort of latent secondary mutation that can rid one of migraines.” His voice was tinged with humor, and Erik simply shook his head.

“Unfortunately, I have yet to perfect that ability.”

Charles smiled briefly before his face screwed up into a grimace once more, his breath catching in his throat. The shorter man’s eyes squeezed shut, and Erik braced himself for another round of unsuccessful attempts to bring back yesterday’s lunch. But after several tense moments, nothing came. Erik shifted back and forth on his heels, the skin of his feet sticking a bit to the linoleum as he moved. Charles’s harsh breathing filled the small room, bouncing off the walls in endless repeat. “Erik?” he huffed out, his eyes still screwed shut. “Erik, I don’t think he’s here anymore.”

“What?”

Charles winced at his volume, and Erik retreated a bit, though his heart was racing now. “The mutant we’re after. I don’t think he’s here anymore.”

Erik ground the heel of his palm into his forehead and tried to suppress the well of anger bubbling up in his chest. “And why do you think this?” he grumbled impatiently.

“I can’t find him anywhere. He was here,” Charles lightly tapped the side of his head before moving back to grip the toilet seat, “bright as day this morning, and I could sense him this afternoon, but now there’s nothing. I think he’s moved on us again.” He grit his teeth and fought back against another wave of nausea.

Erik wanted to scream. Here he was stuck in a dingy hotel with a man who was currently so sick he could barely go three minutes without heaving his guts out, searching for a mutant who was no longer around. It was almost as frustrating as figuring out Shaw’s location.

 _Calm yourself._ The words echoed in his ear, and Erik wasn’t sure if he’d heard them aloud, or if they only existed in his head, they were so quiet.

“And how do you expect me to do that?” he snarled at Charles, who’d gone rather pale once more.

“Please, Erik, for god’s sake, calm yourself down,” Charles ground out. “I don’t give a damn how you do it, but my control isn’t very good at the moment, and I can hear everything you’re thinking right now as loudly as if you were shouting in my ear.”

Erik got the hint. He wasn’t helping. If anything, he was probably making things worse. He threw his head back and breathed out a heavy sigh. The package in his hand crinkled a little, and he gripped it a little tighter. “I’m going outside.” He stepped over Charles and made his way out of the bathroom.

The night air was warm against his skin, and he was grateful that he hadn’t bothered to stop for shoes on his way out the door. The sharp cut of pavement and loose gravel against the skin of his bare feet was calming in its own way. He propped himself up against the wall of the building and let the smoke of his cigarette waft over him in a cloud of billowing white. He didn’t smoke often, but it did wonders on the nerves. They’d start again tomorrow. Maybe move on to the next mutant on their list of coordinates, or perhaps just head back to Virginia so Charles could recover and be of some use again. It was probably for the best anyway.

He flicked the still smoldering butt of his cigarette to the pavement and watched as the last wisps of smoke faded away into the night sky. They could figure everything out in the morning.

\---

Erik was an early riser out of habit. One of the many lessons he’d learned from his time with Shaw was that a man was often at his most vulnerable when asleep. Charles, on the other hand, was not, regardless of whatever gentlemanly training he had growing up. Which perhaps was why Erik was surprised to find Charles seated at the hotel’s little table in the corner when he woke. Thin streaks of sunlight were creeping into the main room from the little window in the bathroom, illuminating the dull red of the carpet, the smooth wood of the table, and throwing long shadows into every corner and across the telepath’s face.

Charles had one of the books he’d brought along laid out on the table in front of him, the little glass from the bathroom sitting just off to the side. The fingers of his left hand were absently stroking the carved bottom of the glass, shifting the water inside ever so slightly, which he watched with a detached sort of interest. The room really wasn’t bright enough yet to make reading an easy task; it wasn’t surprising Charles was more interested in the glass than his book.

 _I wonder if he wishes that were coffee_ , he mused as he watched the other man.

Charles looked up to meet his gaze with a soft smile. “Good morning, Erik. And coffee would be lovely, actually.”

Erik gave up all pretense of sleep and swung his legs over the side of the bed, lifting himself into a sitting position. He leaned forward to rest his elbows on his bent knees and studied the man before him. Charles looked ruffled, his hair askew and still in his rumpled clothes from last night, but the pallor seemed to have left his skin, and he was well enough to pick up on Erik’s stray thoughts. Hopefully they wouldn’t have a repeat of last night, but he felt it best to make sure. He fixed Charles with a hard stare. “How are you feeling?”

“Honestly?” Erik gave a curt nod, and Charles slumped back against the hard back of his chair with a heavy sigh. “Tired, mostly. I wasn’t able to sleep very well at all.”

Erik nodded. Understandable. Charles had still been dry heaving over the toilet when Erik had finally made his way back up to the room, and he’d been camped out in the bathroom when Erik had drifted off. He couldn’t imagine that Charles had gotten much in the way of sleep. He slid his eyes over the man’s frame once more, once more taking in his disheveled appearance. Well, if he really thought about it, based on the state of things he’d be surprised if Charles had managed to get any sleep at all. “Those headaches,” he gestured vaguely at Charles with his hand, “do you get them often?” Erik supposed that, with the nature of Charles’s abilities, they could very well be frequent nuisances. If so, and if they all were as bad as the one from last night, that meant slowing down, something Erik refused to tolerate.

“No. Not really. Headaches themselves are pretty common.” He smiled and tapped the side of his head, his voice lifting with humor. “Kind of comes with the territory of being a telepath,” he said, just as if he’d plucked the words from Erik’s head. Knowing Charles, he probably had. Charles paused, letting his arm fall down into his lap. “But ones like last night? No, they’re usually not that bad. I haven’t had one that bad in years.” His voice was soft, almost like he was ashamed of himself for appearing so weak in front of someone else.

Erik needed to change the subject, move on to the task at hand. Charles’s well-being was important, of course, but now that he was functioning they needed to refocus on the mission. “About last night—you said you couldn’t find the mutant we were after.” Charles gave a slow nod and waited for Erik to continue. He already knew the question lurking behind his companion’s words but wanted Erik to actually speak it aloud before answering. “I don’t know that I trust that, given the state you were in. Is he here now?”

Charles lifted his fingers to his temple and closed his eyes in concentration, seeking out the familiar wavelengths of the man they were after. Erik watched him carefully, studying the subtle shifts in Charles’s expression. After several long, silent moments, Charles deflated with a soft release of air, his hand dropping down over the chair’s armrest. “No. I can’t find him anywhere in range. He’s evaded us again.”

Erik cursed harshly under his breath before turning his attention back to Charles. “So what do you propose we do?”

Charles gave a half-hearted shrug with a small shake of his head. “Give up. We’ve already recruited two mutants as it is, and this one’s managed to get away from us twice. All we’re doing in chasing after him is wasting our time and the government’s money. It’s obvious he doesn’t want to be found.” He turned his head toward the bathroom, focusing on the slowly expanding beams of light creeping over the floor as his face screwed up in thought. “I say we head back to base and look up a new target, perhaps one closer to home this time.”

Erik watched Charles in silence, his mouth crushed up against his knuckles. Charles was hiding something, perhaps another headache, and it was making him uneasy. He wondered if the other man picked up on it. If so, he was doing a damn good job at keeping it to himself. “So what do we tell the CIA?”

Charles shot him a pointed look. “That we failed,” he answered candidly. “It’s perfectly natural. We can’t expect to successfully locate and recruit every single mutant I identify using Cerebro.” His face lit up in a smile. “Even for men with abilities such as ours, Erik, such a task is impossible.”

“I know that,” Erik grumbled, rising to his feet. “It’s just frustrating. We came all the way out here for nothing.”

Charles’s eyes followed him as he walked over to his bag and began rifling through it for a fresh set of clothes. “You should call that agent—”

“Moira?”

His eyebrows rose a bit at the first name, but he didn’t mention it. “Yes, her. You should call her and let her know that we’re on our way back to Virginia.” He straightened. The sleeve of his clean shirt was dangling loosely from the crook of his arm, swaying lightly against his torso. “Maybe she can arrange for faster transportation out of here. That is unless you know of another mutant that’s close by.”

Charles shook his head. “Not one that would be of any use. The closest mutant to us based on the coordinates I can remember lives roughly fifty miles from here, but she’s only three months old.” His hand had moved back to finger the bottom of the glass.

“Then you’re right. She’s of no use to us.” He reached down and grabbed Charles’s bag from the floor. The room was starting to heat up again; he could feel sweat beginning to gather on his brow. If there was nothing for them here, then they’d best move on as quickly as possible. There was no sense waiting around. “Are you hungry?” he asked Charles.

“Famished.”

He tossed the bag into the other man’s lap, just barely missing the glass of water on the table, and tilted his head toward the phone. “Then get yourself put together and call agent MacTaggert. Find out if she can get us a way out of here, preferably without dragging us through an airport. We can grab something to eat on the way out.”

\---

Erik did his best to conceal his confusion at the waves of relief spilling over into his consciousness from Charles as they descended the stairs leading down to the tarmac. In the short time they’d been on this mission, the other man had never shown any signs of distress over flying, and the foreign feelings leeching onto Erik’s own coupled with the way Charles gripped the railing as he carefully stepped down onto the asphalt only served to raise his suspicions. Something was wrong, made all the more worrisome by the fact that Charles was projecting unconsciously again, and whatever it was, Charles didn’t want Erik to know about it. He narrowed his eyes and strengthened his resolve to keep a closer eye on the telepath. They shouldn’t be keeping secrets from one another this late in the game. Not with Shaw waiting for them at the end.

Charles brushed off the bottom of his suit jacket and tugged at the knot of the tie, trying to loosen the fabric a bit. He wavered a little on his feet, like he was having trouble staying upright. Erik stepped up behind him and placed a hand on his shoulder. He could feel Charles start a bit underneath his palm. “Easy, Charles.”

“Erik,” Charles panted, his face now drawn into a frown. “Please don’t do that. You startled me.”

Like he could startle a telepath. Charles was humoring him. Erik could see sweat beading along Charles’s hairline, and his frown deepened. It hadn’t been terribly warm in the plane, nor was it uncomfortable out here on the tarmac, and the man’s face wasn’t flushed, so it was unlikely to be a fever. He fought the urge to press his palm against Charles’s forehead to be sure. He couldn’t deal with the telepath getting taken down by a full blown illness right now. It was another headache, perhaps, which quite possibly meant another long, sleepless night listening to Charles retching in the bathroom down the hall.

“Are you feeling all right, Charles?”

He shrugged out of Erik’s hold. “Of course. Why do you ask?”

“No reason,” he murmured, giving the shorter man another quick inspection. “Are you sure? Did the food not sit well with you? I thought the appetizers were a bit much, but—”

“I’m fine, Erik. The flight was fine, the food was good, and everything is well.”

“But you were rather ill last night. I’m only worried for your health.”

“I’m fine,” Charles repeated, his voice a bit harder than before.

The tension running through Charles’s shoulders told Erik that his companion was going to be defensive about this, and it wasn’t worth fighting at this point, so he let the point drop. Perhaps he’d confront him later when they were back at base. He looked up to see Agent MacTaggart walking briskly toward them, the sound of her heels clicking lightly against the pavement reaching them over the exclamations of loved ones greeting the other passengers as they left the plane. “And there’s our babysitter. Right on time.”

“Oh come now, Erik. Moira is—”

“Being paid to watch over us to ensure we don’t slip up.”

“—our _ally_ ,” Charles stressed. _She’s taken on a big risk in supporting our cause like this._

Erik snorted but didn’t bother arguing. There was little point to it. It wasn’t that he disliked the agent. No, she was attractive and certainly friendly enough, but Erik couldn’t bring himself to trust her, not the way he did Charles. Where Charles was open, the agent seemed hidden; where Charles was warm, the agent cold. It was expected for a person in her position, especially for a woman in a world dominated by men, but that didn’t make it any easier to trust that her intentions were good.

Agent MacTaggart eyed the two of them warily. “So you were unable to find him.” It wasn’t a question.

“No, we were able to figure out his location,” Charles responded, shooting Erik a look that he hoped might keep him in check, like he was some sort of dog that needed to be trained. “However, I think he managed to pick up on our presence somehow before we could get the chance to approach him, though I can’t for the life of me figure out how.”

 _Perhaps it was your projecting_ , Erik couldn’t help thinking, part of him wondering if Charles was even going to bother picking up on it. Charles hadn’t exactly been in complete control last night, what with him hunched up over the toilet at all hours. It was entirely plausible that the mutant they’d been after had picked up on Charles through his projected thoughts and emotions and had simply fled, not wanting to risk detection by the United States government. It wouldn’t surprise him in the slightest to find mutants who didn’t want to join their cause. Not when they were likely to be used as lab rats, in any instance.

Charles shot him a quick glare, showing him that yes, he had heard that, and yes, they were going to talk about it later, before Moira stole away his attention. “We can’t get them all, I suppose.” She looked up at the both of them, and her voice smoothed as her tone took on a more business-like manner. “Do you have another target set up?”

“Not yet,” Erik replied, beating Charles to the punch. “We plan on going over the coordinates we already have and finding reasonable candidates to try out from there. Hank should still have the printouts from the last set of run-throughs with Cerebro. Little should have changed from then.”

“I have to disagree, Erik. I’m fairly sure that in the time that we’ve been away from base there has been some movement of the mutants we were able to identify. I think it would be best if I gave Cerebro another try before we get too far ahead of ourselves.”

_I think you’re being ridiculous, Charles. You don’t need to feed into their experiments like a dog._

_You have it all wrong, my friend._

_Do I?_

_They’re not experimenting on me by letting me use Cerebro, and they’ve been kind enough to let us use their facilities. We should be grateful._

_I find it difficult to be grateful to people I can’t trust. How can you not question the fact that somehow they magically had this machine set up for a man of your unique abilities before they could agree that we actually existed? How can you be so trusting as to think they’re not experimenting on us? Your naivety is astounding sometimes._

Charles ignored him, turning all of his attention to Moira. “We were hoping to stick a little closer to home this time around.”

She gave a quick nod before her face split into a grin, all thoughts of finding and recruiting mutants lost for the moment. There was no indication that she’d suspected them talking to each other telepathically. Erik was getting better at concealing his emotions from responding Charles’s voice in his head. “It’s good to see you two again. Things were getting quiet without you around.”

Charles grinned. “I highly doubt that. Things are rarely quiet when Raven is around.”

The agent’s smile widened. She turned around and gestured for the two of them to follow. “Come on. I have a car waiting.”

“Don’t think we’re done, Charles.” He didn’t bother lowering his voice or sending the words out in thought. The telepath couldn’t ignore him this way. “You still owe me some answers.”

“And I’ll give them to you. All in good time.” His hand lifted to his head to rub gently at his temple, his face drawn tight to hide his subtle wince of pain, and Erik’s face darkened. Charles had never been a very good liar.

\---

It was odd being back at the facility after jumping about from place to place for so long. He was too used to moving around. Staying in any one place for too long gave people the opportunity to find your location. It was one of the stupidest, most amateur moves in the book, but Erik couldn’t bring himself to leave. Charles and his sway with the American government were the key to finding out Shaw’s location. He needed them, no matter how slowly they worked, and on top of that, as loathe as he was to admit it, he’d grown rather fond of Charles in the short time they’d known each other. Things would be made a lot easier, however, if the man would stop keeping secrets.

Erik stared hard at the ceiling and tried to make sense of the patterns of the shadows dancing across the smooth white walls. This was pointless. What they were doing meant nothing unless they were helping in the mutant tagging process that the CIA was certainly after, now that they knew people like Charles, people like Raven, people like _him_ , existed. His mouth twisted into a scowl. Identification was always where it started. Erik knew exactly where this would end if they let it go on too long.

Four mutants. That was all they’d been able to recover in all this time, bringing their official total up to seven if he counted himself, the professor, and Hank, as useless as his mutation seemed to be. Some of the others, though, they could be useful. If identification was the goal, the CIA could simply steal the printouts from Cerebro. But he had the feeling that they were just as invested in getting rid of Shaw as he was, what with the threat of nuclear war he was dangling over their heads. The mutants were going to help them save the United States from disaster, he supposed, but they were kidding themselves if they thought this misfit group was ready to handle anything. The kids had already proven themselves unfit earlier tonight. But with practice, training and discipline, perhaps something could be made out of them.

The Negro cabbie, Armando or Darwin or whatever, was able to survive most anything anyone threw at him. _Like a cockroach_ , he thought. _How fitting._ But that could have its uses. Particularly against a man like Shaw. No matter how hard of a hit Shaw tried to land, Armando could take it. Perhaps using him as a distraction or a shield might give Erik enough time to run the coin right between Shaw’s eyes.

The stripper and the redhead were fairly useless. The girl’s wings would have come in handy if not for the fact that one of Shaw’s men controlled the wind. He seriously doubted that her flimsy wings could be any competition with even the smallest windstorm he decided to cook up. And the boy, Sean, he could scream at supersonic levels. Maybe he’d be useful as a foot soldier, but unless Charles had something spectacular hidden up his sleeve for the kid, he was fairly useless.

Raven, however, was by far the best; her ability to mimic anyone both in voice and body was exceptional, and would trick anyone under Shaw’s grasp outside of the telepath. If Charles could somehow incapacitate that damn woman in white, then Raven and Armando could keep Shaw busy while Erik dealt the final blow. They could wrap this up quickly and with little bloodshed, just the way Charles liked things. They just needed training, discipline. The CIA would never take them seriously if these kids were allowed to run free.

He shot up on his bed, his mind made up. They needed to plan this whole thing out, figure out their next move. He needed to talk to Charles.

He pressed in the little metal buttons used to lock his door in the pattern of code he’d been taught from across the room as he shrugged on one of his jackets. It wasn’t cold inside the facility, but the extra clothing made him feel a little more secure. The locked clicked into place, and he was free. He stepped out into the hallway. Charles’s room was just a little ways down.

The two of them and the agents left for the Soviet Union in little over a half hour. Not enough time to do anything, really. Why not discuss how they were going to tackle the Shaw dilemma with Charles before they had to head out? He stopped in front of the telepath’s door, his hand raised to knock, when a strange feeling overtook him, almost like panic. The emotion wasn’t his own. He rapped harshly on the door.

“Charles?”

There was no answer.

“Damn it, Charles. Answer me.”

Nothing.

He flicked the lock out of place, not even bothering with the passcodes and stepped inside, intent on getting an answer out of Charles. The door flung open, and Charles looked up, surprised, at the sound of it hitting the wall. He was seated on his bed, holding a thin stack of papers in his hand—what looked like the coordinate printouts from Cerebro. “Erik. What are you doing here?” He didn’t need to ask how Erik got in. Metal locks, electronic or not, meant nothing to Erik.

“Did you not hear me outside?” he growled, irritated. The feeling of panic had dulled into a soft hum at the back of his mind. Charles was fine. He’d gotten worked up over nothing.

“No, I admit was somewhat absorbed in this.” Charles gestured at the papers in his hand. Erik strode forward and sat down beside him. They were indeed the printouts from Cerebro. There were tiny marks littered across the sheets in blue ink, indicating which ones were worth looking into and which one were failures: too young, too old, uncooperative, etc.

“And just what were you doing? If you don’t mind me asking.”

“Not at all. I was thinking about how to approach the Shaw problem. Obviously Shaw has mutants on his side, and we need to strategize around the abilities of his cohorts and of Shaw himself.” He turned to Erik and shot him a tired grin. “An army means nothing if we don’t know our enemy.”

Erik snorted. “You know, I was just thinking about this myself: how we can use every power we currently have at our disposal to our advantage. The problem, Charles, lies in our recruits.”

“I see nothing wrong with them.”

“They’re untrained, unruly, undisciplined.” _Not to mention almost entirely useless in terms of strategy when it comes to their abilities versus Shaw’s team._ “You saw them earlier.”

Charles sighed. He knew this, but he had faith that the other mutants would be a valuable asset in taking down Shaw. He just wasn’t sure how to get them motivated enough to be of any help. They hadn’t exactly earned anyone’s trust after their destructive actions tonight.

“Charles.”

“Yes?” He’d drifted off again. He needed to fix that. They were too short on time for him to be getting distracted. Erik’s face was drawn up into a concerned frown. Odd, he hadn’t picked up on the other man’s distress. Erik’s feelings were usually so loud he had trouble not noticing them. His sharp emotions were like someone yelling in his ear, and this time there hadn’t been so much as a whisper. “What is it, Erik?”

“You’re bleeding.” Erik brought a hand up to his own nose, indicating where the blood must be coming from.

“What?” Charles swiped a hand under his nose, and when it came away smeared in red, he gave a soft curse. He pushed himself from the bed and stumbled toward the door, intent on grabbing some tissue from the bathroom across the way. Erik was right on his heels.

Water helped. Tissues helped. Soon enough the bleeding was under control, and Charles was wiping his dripping face with one of the towels hanging by the sink. Erik was leaned up against the counter staring at him, his arms crossed tightly over his chest.

“Are you sure you’re going to be okay to fly, Charles? We need you on this mission, but you have to be at your best. Shaw isn’t playing games.”

He scowled at Erik and crushed the crumpled towel down onto the counter. “Don’t you think I know that, Erik? I’m fine,” he hissed, shoving himself away from the sink. The collar of his shirt was dark with water that he’d missed. Charles stormed for the door. “I’ll meet you outside your room in five minutes. We can discuss this later.” The door slammed shut, leaving Erik standing alone in the bathroom with nothing but his thoughts.

“Whatever you say, Charles.”


	2. Chapter 2

“We’ve got a problem.”

Of course. There was always a problem.

Erik tried to remain calm as Agent MacTaggert blustered at them about their upcoming predicament. He could see the vague outlines of soldiers and a gate in the distance, buried deep among the trees lining the road. Stupid. The CIA should have realized that there would be road blocks in the area, it being so near to such an important secret compound, and poor planning on their part was going to be their undoing. At least there was enough metal in the guns and equipment around him that he could use as makeshift weapons if the need arose. He wasn’t going to let one woman’s stupid mistake cost him his chance of getting at Shaw. The coin in his pocket burned.

Charles leaned forward toward the flap, his fingers weakly grasping the frame of the window between the cab and the back of the truck as they tumbled down the uneven road. Erik briefly thought back to Charles hunched over the sink in the bathroom back at base, wiping thin smears of blood from his face. He hadn’t shown any signs of weakness since then, but Erik wasn’t all that familiar with Charles’s acting abilities. The white of his skin peeking out from his gloves was all too telling.

“No matter what happens, act normally. I’ll take care of this, all right?” Erik could hear the anxiety in the slight tremor threading through Charles’s voice, but he kept quiet. It wouldn’t do to burst everyone’s confidence in the telepath when their lives were on the line, especially since Charles didn‘t appear to be all that confident in his own abilities at the moment.

Charles closed the flap shut and turned to face the soldiers crowded around them, his face set in determination. “Okay, listen to me. We don’t have much time. When we come to a stop, I need you all to be silent. Not a word. I can make whoever is outside this compartment think that they’re looking at an empty truck, but I need your full cooperation.” His eyes swept over them all, and his voice lowered with gravity. “One wrong move, and we’re all as good as dead. You follow me?”

The men nodded, but Erik could feel a few of them grip their guns a little tighter. They would do as Charles said, but that didn’t mean they trusted him. They simply had run out of options.

The truck screeched to a halt. There were dogs barking outside. There were always dogs. Erik curled his hands into fists and resisted the urge to choke the wretched animals who were stupidly giving away the position of their masters with the collars and chains wrapped around their throats. The soldiers were just as uneasy, the ones closest to the door already lining their guns up with the opening, just in case. Charles was just as quick to his feet as they were to their arms, ready for whatever might happen. Perhaps Erik had been imagining things.

“Woah, easy, easy. Take it easy, chaps,” Charles murmured quietly, grabbing hold of the top of the truck to steady himself. _Fine job of following your own rule of staying quiet there, Charles._ But Charles was concentrating too hard on the door to pay him any heed. His fingers were at his temple, and his face was drawn tight with concentration.

Erik wondered briefly if the anxiety of the men was leaking into Charles’s brain, making it that much more difficult to concentrate. The footsteps were growing louder outside; the soldiers all had their guns pointed at the door, ready for action in case Charles’s plan fell through. Erik sucked in a deep breath and tried to calm himself. Charles needed all the help he could get at this point. Their lives were in his hands.

The squeal of the lock echoed loudly in their ears, and Erik gripped the edge of his seat. He’d been here before, in this position. With the dogs and soldiers searching for him, out for blood. The coin buzzed in his pocket, singing to him like a siren. He promised himself that he’d save it for Shaw, but desperate times called for desperate measures. The doors were suddenly flung open and—

Nothing. Nothing happened.

The soldier on the ground scanned over them, his eyes going straight through the whole group as though they weren’t really there. Moira’s contemporary, Levene, was speaking again, in Russian, and Erik couldn’t be bothered to translate. He was too focused on the weaponry strapped to the Soviet soldier standing just outside the van and the veins sticking out on Charles’s neck. But the doors finally closed, and they were plunged into darkness, into safety once more. The group let out a collective breath in relief. Erik patted Charles roughly on the knee in congratulations as the he sank back down into his seat. “Nicely done, Charles.”

And if the other man’s smile was weak, Erik was too flushed with adrenaline to notice.

\---

It wasn’t hard finding the base, nor did they have to wait very long for Shaw’s helicopter to arrive. It was an ugly, bulbous thing, but it seemed to do its job. Erik forced his binoculars a little harder against his face, hoping that perhaps the painful press of them against his skin might make things that much easier to zoom in on Shaw. But Shaw wasn’t there. It was only that other telepath, Emma or something, flouncing in through the gates like she owned the place, and Soviet guards rushing out to meet her. She was alone. Erik’s blood began to boil.

He pulled the binoculars from his face and squinted at the compound. “Where’s Shaw?”

“I don’t know,” Charles murmured.

_What do you mean, ’you don’t know.’ Just read her thoughts and figure it out._ Charles fixed him with a look. He’d gotten the message.

“She’s a telepath,” he explained, “and if I read her, she’ll know we’re here.” He turned back to the knoll that kept them hidden, to the telepath and the Soviet official who had just come out to greet her. “Let me try something else.” And he went quiet, his fingers going up to rest against the side of his head once more. Erik wasn’t exactly sure what Charles was doing, but judging from the lines on his face, the hold of his breath, and the sweat beading up along his brow despite the cold, it was difficult. He picked up his binoculars once more.

Erik watched as the telepath was lead inside the house as a welcome guest, and he guessed that whatever Charles had done had something to do with the guard leaning in toward the entrance. Helpful little trick, that.

“He’s not coming,” said Charles. And with those words, Erik’s mind was made up. He needed to get inside that house. Charles was talking quietly with Moira at his elbow.

“So what now, boss?”

“Now nothing. We’re here for Shaw. Mission aborted.”

_Mission aborted._ The words echoed around in his head. _Mission aborted._ Erik couldn’t abide by that. “The hell it is,” he growled. He moved to push himself to his feet, but Moira’s hand on his jacket pulled him back down.

“Erik.” There was danger in her voice; he wasn’t getting out of here without an explanation. He pointed toward the building around the binoculars in his hand.

“She’s his right hand woman. That’s good enough for me.” With enough of the right kind of persuasion, she would help him find Shaw.

Moira merely stared at him like he’d grown a second head. “The CIA invading the home of a senior Soviet official Are you crazy?”

And Erik could do nothing but smile at her naivety. She had severely misjudged him if she thought he was letting this opportunity slip away so easily. “I’m not CIA.”

Somewhere in the back of his mind, he could hear Charles softly calling out to him, but he wasn’t sure if he was imagining it or not. It was too late to turn back. His gateway to Shaw was in that house, and he’d be damned if Charles was going to stop him again. He’d waited for this long enough already.

\---

Barbed wire. Humans were so very predictable.

Erik could feel the jagged metal calling out to him as he approached the building from the shelter of the trees surrounding him, and he twisted it out of its looped coils around the fences to wrap around the bodies of the guards. The first guard he threw to the grass, the second fell like a stone, thick ropes of wire cutting into the skin of his legs. Erik knew it would cause enough of a disturbance to draw the attention of the guards at the door, which was exactly what he wanted. And he hadn’t killed anybody—not yet—and that should be more than enough to satisfy Charles’s bleeding heart.

The frosted grass crunched under his shoes as he raced toward the compound. He flung away fences and barriers as easily as if they had been made of paper. There was metal everywhere: in the barbed wire, in the gates, in the weapons and uniforms strapped to the bodies of the guards scattered throughout the grounds, and it was all at his beck and call.

The two men posted at the door stalked forward, their guns leveled at him, and he brought them to their knees, dragging them forward by the guns they held until they were off-balance before throwing his hands into the air and knocking them down as he passed. He thought briefly of killing them, eliminate any witnesses just like his previous missions in hunting down the men who had hurt him so as a boy, but that would take far too much time. He needed to find the telepath. He needed to find Shaw, the man who had started it all.

He slowed his pace as he walked inside. The layout of the place was fairly simple, and all he had to do was follow the sound of the voices coming in from just down the hall. More men. More guns. More useless attempts to stop him.

“Erik!” He stopped and turned to find Charles running up to meet him.

“You’re not going to stop me, Charles.”

Charles slowed. His chest was heaving with his harsh breaths. “Just what exactly do you think you’re doing? We can’t come waltzing in here without there being consequences. Just because we’re not official members of the CIA doesn’t mean that the Soviets won’t see this as a direct assault on one of their senior officials.”

“Then it’s a good thing we’re just here for the woman. You can wipe their minds or whatever it is that you do to cover up for any misgivings you see, but the telepath is all that matters right now.” He turned and started back down the hall. “I’m not going back until I have the information I need from her.”

Charles growled in frustration but followed along behind. Erik gave him a look the second Charles pulled up beside him. Charles didn’t even need to read Erik to know the question pressing on the back of his lips.

“Because you can’t do this without me. You’re no match for Ms. Frost on your own.”

“And I suppose you are?”

Charles tapped the side of his head. “Telepath. I, at the very least, have the tools to stand against her. You, my friend, do not.”

Erik snorted and pressed on. Charles could stick around if he wanted as long as he made himself useful and didn’t get in the way. They were close. He couldn’t hear any more soldiers, and this certainly looked like a master bedroom of sorts. Erik was sure that the woman they were after was not above using sex to her advantage, not the way she had been dressed, and from the sounds coming from the other side of the door ahead, his assumption couldn‘t be far off.

He and Charles burst through the door to find the Soviet Chief of Defense flailing about on the large bed against the wall, fondling the air and mumbling words of adoration like he was caressing a beautiful woman. A doppelganger, he supposed. And judging by how little clothing Ms. Frost, as Charles had called her, was wearing, she apparently hadn’t been expecting anyone to interrupt this little…session. There had been no need for her to project whatever the Soviet official was seeing into their brains as well.

“Nice trick,” Charles quietly shot at her, and suddenly the man’s movements stilled, like he was waking from a trance. He looked from Charles and Erik to Emma in disbelief before reaching for the gun still holstered at his hip. “Go to sleep,” Charles ordered. And he did.

Emma rose from her chair and her skin dissolved away into smooth, clear stone, the sunlight peeking in through the window reflecting a thousand colors in the endless facets of her body. Erik had seen this once before, and he knew how dangerous she could be. Charles did not. The shorter man began to back away toward the wall, his fingers pressed hard against the side of his head.

“You can stop trying to read my mind, sugar,” Emma purred, her voice smooth as silk. “You’re never going to get anything from me when I’m like this.” Charles was gasping and grimacing in pain, his body curling in a little on itself the longer time dragged on. She fixed her eyes on Charles, and her mouth curled up into a smile. _She was enjoying this_. Erik felt hot, burning rage flare up in his gut, and when Frost leapt for the door, he was one step ahead of her; Charles, surprisingly quick on his feet, was on his other side, the both of them dragging her back to the ground and over to the bed where they could get some semblance of restraints on her.

The metal bed frame wrapped around her body, trapping her effectively against the floor, refusing to budge no matter how hard she struggled. Erik could hear Charles’s heavy, panting breaths just off to his left. He was still flinching a bit with every move he made, though Erik was certain that the assault on his mind for trying to read the other telepath had passed. Whatever the woman on the floor had done to him had probably worsened whatever the hell was wrong with him in the first place, and that only made his rage burn hotter. He needed Charles in tact, damn it.

Fine. Charles wasn’t going to pull anything from her head when she was made of crystal. Fair enough. “So then you can just tell us,” he snarled. They had the upper hand. She had nowhere to go and was now completely at their mercy. “Where’s Shaw?”

She wouldn’t give up, and Erik’s patience was just about at its limit. He wrapped the piping of the metal bed frame around her throat and squeezed. Charles was protesting in the background, but he was unimportant. Not when this woman was the one blocking them from everything they needed, and so far she had yet to respond to anything but violence. Well, he’d give her violence. The coil tightened ever further.

And she gave up. The facets of her neck shattered; the illusion fell. She was once again flesh and bone as they were, soft and vulnerable. The pale skin of her face flushed with defeat, her blue eyes glowing with hate as she watched Erik work his way over to the couch she had vacated only moments before to pour himself a drink into one of the crystal tumblers littering the table.

“She won’t be shifting into her other form again,” he informed Charles. She wouldn’t dare unless she wanted to forfeit her life. “And if she does, just give her a gentle tap.”

Charles said nothing. He glanced at Erik briefly before kneeling to the ground, his fingers inching back up to his head. Emma simply smiled at him, her eyes boring deep into the very core of his being. “Oh Charles, honey, you really shouldn’t hide things like that.”

Charles’s face twisted a bit, but he remained steady, completely focused on the task at hand. Erik lifted his glass to his lips and said nothing, watching every move Charles made, scrutinizing every subtle change to his face. Ms. Frost could be lying; it would be a perfect plan to psyche them out, till the soil where the seed of doubt in Charles’s ability had already been planted in Erik’s mind, but now was not the time to think about it. Right now all Erik wanted was Shaw. Charles and all of his damn secrets would have to wait.

\---

Charles lowered his hand and went very, very still. Emma’s smile was wide and predatory.

“So what is it, Charles? What is Shaw planning?”

He lowered his hand from his head and cast Erik with a stricken look. “He wants to start World War Three.” Erik nearly choked on his liquor, and Charles continued, his voice grim. “The radiation from nuclear warfare between the United States and the Soviet Union would have minimal effect on the mutant population compared to the average human being. Shaw wants to use that to his advantage. Essentially wipe out mankind.” He turned back to Emma. “We’re taking you with us. I couldn’t glean all the details of what Shaw plans to do, and the CIA will want to question you.”

“And how exactly are we going to get her out of here, Charles?”

“Well, first we’re going to get her some clothing. It’s indecent for her to wander around like this.” He tilted his head toward the metal coat rack at the far end of the room where the furred white hat and overcoat Emma had been wearing when she’d arrived hung. Erik dragged the thing over to Charles with a wave, and the coat was swiftly draped over her body like a blanket. “Then I suppose we’ll get out the same way we got in. You can keep her restrained, I presume?” Erik nodded. “Good. Then I’ll do my best to keep the guards from recognizing our faces.”

“You know, that would be a lot more effective if you released my arms.” Emma shifted and the coat slid down toward her belly, once again revealing her barely-covered breasts. Erik pointedly ignored her.

“And then what, Charles? We know Shaw’s plans. We have everything we need from her, and the defense chief knows she tricked him into quite possibly revealing classified information about the Soviet Union’s nuclear weapons.” He scowled at the sleeping man in the bed. “Let’s just leave her and let the Soviets deal with her as they see fit.”

Charles opened his mouth to respond, but Emma beat him to it. “I think you gentlemen might be forgetting something. I never told you where to go to find Mr. Shaw, now did I?” she chimed in smugly. Both men fell silent and stared at her. Charles hadn’t gotten that far past Shaw’s plans for world dominance to actually figure out where the man was.

“Get it from her, Charles.”

“I can’t.”

“What do you mean you can’t? You got the information about Shaw’s plans like it was nothing. Now dig a little deeper and find out where he is!”

“I can’t, Erik! We don’t have much time before he wakes up,” he nodded toward the Soviet official on the bed. “I can’t keep him down forever. And on top of that, you left a rather impressive trail of guards in your wake that most certainly saw your face. I have to deal with them too. Unless, of course, you want to be personally responsible for even more antagonism between the world’s two biggest superpowers.”

Erik blanched. He hadn’t thought about that before he’d stormed into the compound. Only finding Shaw, finding the telepath had been important. Normally, witnesses weren’t a problem when he was on a mission, but as of late, Charles’s pacifist ideals had been leaking more and more into his subconscious. Saving lives meant leaving witnesses, which in turn left a mess.

Charles kept going, his eyes flicking over toward the window. He could feel the presence of the guards moving about outside. There was only so much he could do to hold them off, and he knew Moira couldn’t keep her partner from hauling out and leaving for very much longer, no matter what kind of prisoner they’d managed to capture. Erik had already blown their cover; he and Charles were as good as dead to them at this point. “We need to hurry. The agents aren’t going to wait around much longer for us to make up our minds. The CIA will want to question her, too, and the sooner we get out of here, the better.”

His logic was sound, as much as Erik didn’t want to admit it. Charles was right. It was best to leave as soon as possible. But then again, Charles always seemed to be right. “Fine. But don’t think that we won’t try getting the information from her on the flight back to base.”

“Now, boys, if you really wanted to know where Shaw is, all you had to do was ask.”

“What?”

She was grinning again. Erik closed the metal in around her throat a little tighter, wiping the smile from her face. “Where’s Shaw?” She was silent. The smooth surface of the piping was digging deep into her neck, and it was starting to cut off her air. “I won’t ask again,” he growled.

“That isn’t any way to treat a lady,” she rasped out, glaring daggers at Erik as her arms strained against her bonds. She held the upper hand here, even without the use of her telepathy or diamond form; she didn’t have to tell them any more than she wanted to.

“Erik, that’s enough,” Charles admonished him once more, and Erik released his grip. Emma fell back against the floor in relief now that the pressure had lightened. Charles turned his full attention back to her. “What did you mean by that?”

“I meant that your little base back in the States isn’t as secure as you think.”

Charles was the one to go pale this time and he quickly staggered to his feet. “Erik. Get her up. _Now._ We’re leaving.”

Erik didn’t question him. He twisted apart the metal frame of the bed until the pieces encircling Emma’s wrists snapped free from the structure. She still wore pieces of the brass piping around her neck and wrists, almost like jewelry. Erik would be in near complete control should she decide not to cooperate again. He grabbed her dress from the floor while Charles wandered over to the window. His fingers were digging urgently into the side of his head; he was probably trying to contact Moira.

Erik stepped forward and thrust the dress into Emma’s arms. “You’d best put this back on. Unless you’d rather walk around in the cold in that.” He nodded at her scant lingerie, completely unfazed by her nakedness. She scowled but didn’t bother to argue. Any clothing was better than not when she couldn’t shift into her other form. She defiantly grabbed her coat from the floor where it had fallen and draped it around her shoulders.

“We need to get out of here.” Charles’s voice was breathy as he moved back to join them, and there was a haunted look in his eye. “Shaw found the others.”

\---

It had grown colder since they’d entered the defense chief’s hideout. Their breath plumed out in front of them like smoke as they raced toward the grassy knoll where the CIA had hidden the truck. It was silent save for the crunch of the frosted grass under their feet and the soft pants of their breathing as they fled the building. The guards scattered across the grounds were still as death, some still wrapped in the thick coils of barbed wire from Erik’s brash entrance, but they were all alive from the looks of it; Charles appeared to be doing something to them to keep them down. His hand never left the side of his head, and Erik could see a growing pallor sweep over the skin of the telepath’s face. He looked nervous and edgy, worn a little too thin for Erik’s liking. He was probably worrying over his sister and the others back at base.

And speaking of telepaths, he could feel the woman falling behind yet again. She was dragging her feet. He growled a bit and tugged at her metal bonds, pulling her forward with a rough jerk. He could feel the sharp edges of her mind prickling at the back of his own.

“Best watch that,” he warned her. “You’re not the only one with that particular weapon at your disposal.” He nodded toward Charles, who was at the forefront of their little group. Emma quickened her pace with a little smile, jogging up behind Erik with a breathy chuckle.

“You really don’t know a thing, do you, sugar?”

The thick circlet around her neck bit into her skin as anger rose up unbidden in the pit of his stomach. “Just what are you insinuating?”

“Easy now.” Her voice was quieter now, a little rougher than he was used to. Like her throat was raw. Good. Keeping her bound had been a good idea. The sharp prickle in his head was receding, and he lessened his grip on the metal around her throat. This woman made him more uneasy than he cared to admit. She brushed away a lock of blonde hair that had fallen across her face and then fingered the smooth metal around her neck. “That’s a little better, I guess. Are these really necessary? I’m not about to run away, you know.”

“Of course they’re necessary, and I can’t trust a single word that leaves your mouth.”

Her smiled only widened. “Am I really that much of a threat?”

“Yes.”

“But I’m only a woman. What harm could I do?”

“Plenty. You being a woman has very little to do with anything. You should know that your tricks won’t work here.” He’d been at her mercy before. She was far less dangerous now that he’d temporarily gained control of her diamond form, but that didn’t mean that she couldn’t wheedle her way under his skin with her words, make the doubt that had already burrowed its way into his brain grow like a weed until it consumed him. He studied Charles’s back, and scowled. He couldn’t afford to doubt Charles. Not now. No matter how much poison Emma spilled into his ear. She’d also distracted them from Shaw and allowed him the time to gain access to the young mutants tucked away inside their base in Virginia, killing at least one of them, if the report from Charles was to be believed. Just one more grievance to add to his list.

Erik’s strides grew longer. The hazy silhouettes of agents were climbing up out of the fog. The sooner they were on their way back to the United States, the sooner he was able to get rid of her, and he’d sleep all the better for it. She’d be the CIA’s problem then.

“Your friend isn’t telling you everything.”

Damn this woman and her infernal mouth. “I know that,” he growled. “Everyone is entitled to their secrets.”

“ Are they really? Does that mean I don’t have to tell you where my boss is hiding out?” Her tone was light, bored almost, and that only served to infuriate him more. Erik could hear the voices of agents calling out to them, but they were muffled to his ears. He tightened the metal bands around her wrists, hoping that they dug painfully into her pretty white skin. She could do with some scars.

“You’ll tell the CIA everything they need to know.”

“Is that so?”

“Yes.” He couldn’t wait to be rid of her. She was grating in more ways than one, and it was obvious that she wasn’t going to tell them a damn thing about Shaw. That made her useless. Perhaps the American government might find some use for her. He didn’t particularly care, just as long as she was out of his care. At least now he had the addition of their little band of agents to distract him.

“Charles.” Moira jogged up to meet them. Her face was flushed with the cold. Erik did his best to ignore the blonde woman at his side, even though she warranted an odd look from Moira. “What—”

“It’s best you don’t ask. She’s cooperative, and that’s all that matters right now.” Erik jerked Emma forward using the metal bands around her wrists, and she scowled at him, her pale face twisted in fury. Charles paid them little heed. He needed to know if his sister was safe.

“Is Raven hurt?”

Moira shook her head. “No. According to the reports I’ve been able to get, it was Muñoz who was killed. And there’s been no sign of the Salvadore girl.”

“We need to get back. Are the rest of them safe?”

“For the time being. They haven’t been moved from the compound.”

“Is it safe for them to be there?”

“It’s the most secure location we have for them right now. Most of the men that had been stationed there are dead.”

Erik was growing impatient but schooled his face to stone, trying not to let his irritation show. “I hate to interrupt, but shouldn’t we be heading out? I would think that after this mess, getting back to the compound as quickly as possible would be top priority. You can brief us on the way.” He locked eyes with the agent. “Unless, of course, this information is classified, in which case it might not be the wisest idea to repeat such things in front of our guest.” He nodded toward Emma, who simply watched the exchange in silence. Her blue eyes watched him like a hawk.

Moira’s face flushed with heat. “Yes, of course. The sooner we get back, the better.” She turned on her heel and led the way to where the truck sat idling on the road, thick white exhaust spilling from the tailpipe into the frozen air.

_You don’t think I could just take whatever I need from her? You overestimate this human._ Emma’s voice was echoing through his skull, her tone smooth as silk.

“Stay out of my head,” he growled softly. He didn’t dare think his words back to her, not when Charles could be listening in. He still didn’t fully understand the nature of Charles’s mutation and everything it entailed; it was best to play it safe.

She was smiling again. _Why? You’re so very easy to read._

He stayed silent as they climbed up into the truck. The soldiers huddled along the benches in the back were eying Emma without shame, and she was drinking in the attention like water. She settled herself down beside Erik, shifting her body just enough to show an indecent amount of leg. Erik snorted in disgust and turned his gaze toward the floor. The doors slammed shut and the truck started forward with a jolt. Charles was leaning low over his knees, his hands gripping the hard edge of their seat like a lifeline. He was taking the news of the attack rather hard.

_He’s pretty weak, isn’t he?_ She was gloating, taunting him with the doubts hanging over Erik’s head about Charles and his abilities. The man was just worried about his sister and the other children back in the States. There was nothing wrong with him. Not right now, anyway.

_Watch your tongue or I’ll break your neck_ , he snarled back, no longer caring if Charles heard. The metal around Emma’s neck was growing tight again, but this time her smile didn’t fade.

_But you already have me where you want me, and if I die, you’ll never know where your precious ‘Doktor’ is hiding. Your threat is losing its sting, honey._

_You weren’t going to tell us his location anyway._ Her skin was turning red, but he couldn’t tell if it was from the pressure or the cold. He still had yet to wipe that damn smile from her lips.

_I know what’s wrong with your little telepath friend._

Erik snarled but said nothing. He didn’t ease the pressure on her throat.

“Don’t deny that you’re curious,” she said aloud, catching the attention of a few of the men. Her voice was thin and breathy, nothing at all like how she sounded in his head. Erik shot the men around them a heated glare, and they turned away, pretending that they hadn’t heard a thing. Charles still looked to be completely focused on trying to stay upright. It seemed he hadn’t picked up on his little talk with Emma. _Curiosity’s a natural thing, Erik._ It was strange hearing her say his name, and his eyes narrowed at the unwelcome familiarity. _Saying you’re not even curious about what’s going on with him would make you a liar. God doesn’t take too kindly to liars._

He thought about choking her, strangling her right there in the truck, but it wouldn’t do him any good. They didn’t really need her alive, but she was no use to anyone dead. He released his grip on her bonds, and she sucked in a deep breath, rubbing lightly at the bruised skin of her neck with dainty, white fingers. His own fingers were cutting red crescents into his palms where his nails had dug hard into the skin. He fixed her with a hard stare. What did this woman know of God?

_Then I suppose it’s a good thing He abandoned me a long time ago._

\---

Erik hadn’t thought it possible, but the plane ride back from the Soviet Union was even more tense than the ride over. The men were restless and nervous, the agents were falling over themselves trying to figure out what to do with the new information on Shaw, and Charles was still not quite himself. The addition of their new guest probably wasn’t helping matters.

He turned around in his seat to catch a glimpse of Emma, who was thankfully still asleep. She’d been surprisingly complacent after he’d stopped responding to her prodding in the truck, and their mental conversation had fallen silent. She had agreed to their terms, claiming helplessness without the aid of her boss while warming herself up to the company of the CIA, even going so far as to accept the assistance of an over-friendly soldier who’d offered to help her climb aboard their plane. She’d fallen asleep shortly after take off and had yet to wake. Erik wasn’t buying the act for a second. The metal rings stayed in place.

He scowled at the easy curve of her body in the seat of the plane, the relaxed set of her shoulders. The tiny white dress she had wrapped around her body had bunched up tight about her waist, revealing hints of her undergarments and smooth, white legs that seemed to go on forever. There was little wonder why the men on the aircraft seemed so taken with her.

He turned around and slumped low in his seat, pulling the edges of his jacket tight around his body in an attempt to ward off the chill that had descended upon the cabin. It made the seats far stiffer than they should have been, and it was damnably hard to get comfortable. How that insufferable woman had ever fallen asleep (and stayed asleep, for that matter) was a mystery to him. He quickly checked his watch before pulling his arm back into his sleeve and turning his gaze to the window. There were tiny tendrils of white frost creeping up the edges of the glass, obscuring the view of the clouds. They still had another seven hours to go.

“Erik.”

Charles. Erik turned to face the other man, surprised at the sound of his voice. It was so quiet it was almost a whisper. “Charles. I thought you’d gone to sleep.”

Charles gave a tiny shake of his head and curled in a little further into the folds of his jacket. “Sleep is probably the furthest thing from my mind right now.”

Erik looked around the cabin, at the lowered heads of slumbering soldiers, and he sighed, pushing himself up from his seat to sit beside Charles. Even through the fabric of his pants, Charles’s skin was like ice. He shot a quick look to the sleeping telepath behind them and then back to his companion’s pale face. “Are you cold?”

Charles shrugged. The collar of his coat rose up a bit around his neck. “A little.”

“Give me your hands.”

“What?”

“Let me see your hands.” Erik held out his own, palms facing toward the ceiling, and gestured with his fingers for Charles to do the same. Charles simply stared at him with a bemused look on his face.

“Erik, I don’t see what—”

“Just give me your hands, Charles. It’ll only be for a little while.”

Charles unfolded his arms and drew back the sleeves of his coat, exposing the slightly frayed wool of his fingerless gloves. Erik grabbed hold of his hands and trapped them firmly between his own, gently rubbing the covered skin with his thumbs to get some blood flowing back into the other man’s fingers. The skin of his hands was just as cold as Erik had imagined; it was almost jarring against the heat of his fingers.

“Are you doing something perverse with my hands, Erik?” Charles asked with a smile. He didn’t pull back; his hands stayed firmly in place.

“Perhaps,” Erik replied with a grin. “But you’re the mind-reader. You’d have to tell me.”

Charles let out a soft chuckle, and Erik felt his mood lightening. He hadn’t really had the chance to simply sit and talk to Charles in some time. He hadn’t thought he’d miss it as much as he did. The man was surprisingly good company.

“You’re worried about Raven. And the others,” he quickly added, remembering the small group of mutants they’d left behind in Virginia. Muñoz was dead, Salvadore missing. The rest were accounted for as far as they knew, but their information was old by now. Anything could have happened to them in the meantime, especially if the casualty reports for the non-mutants at the base were accurate. Shaw was nothing if not thorough. His fingers dug in a little harder into Charles’s hands.

“Erik, you’re hurting me.”

“Sorry,” he murmured, coming back to himself. His hands stilled and he softened his grip, but Charles didn’t pull away. His eyes were fixed on their hands, at the junction where their fingertips met. He was being far too quiet.

“You’re right.” His response was barely more than a whisper. “I am worried about her.”

“You shouldn’t be. Raven is a very capable girl, and as far as we know, she still has Hank. He’s not the most intimidating of men, but I know how fond he is of your sister. He would protect her if anything more were to happen.”

That got a smile out of him. “You’re not helping. Hank is a wonderful young man, but I’m not sure that I trust him alone with my sister.”

“She’s a smart girl. She knows what she’s doing.”

“You don’t know her the way I do.”

Erik shook his head with a soft chuckle and released Charles’s hands. “No, I suppose not. Siblings are somewhat of a foreign concept to me.”

Charles rubbed at his hands through his gloves, surprised at the gentle warmth that was now flowing through his fingers. “How did you do that?”

“Do what?”

“Make my hands functional again.” He flexed his fingers before bringing his hands together once more. His right hand picked absently at the glove covering his left. “They’re always cold. It’s why I’m so partial to these ruddy things.”

Erik raised an eyebrow, his grin widening. “But cutting off the fingers? How is that supposed to keep you warm?”

“It’s not.” Charles tucked his hands back inside his sleeves and hugged his jacket a little more tightly around his body. “But I don’t like being unable to actually feel things when I touch them.” His face had gone pale again, and Erik could see the tension building up in his shoulders. Charles shut his eyes and breathed in deep.

“Are you all right?”

“Just a headache.”

He’d been getting a lot of those lately. Erik looked back at Emma. She was still asleep. “Is it her?”

“Perhaps,” Charles muttered softly. “It is harder to concentrate when she’s around, even when she’s asleep.”

“I’m sure the men would agree with you,” Erik snorted. Charles just smiled.

“I’m sure they would. Ms. Frost certainly does have a way about her.” He took in another deep breath and his expression fell. “I don’t like this, Erik.”

Erik couldn’t exactly say he was comfortable with the situation either, but at least now they had some idea of what Shaw was planning. And with his telepath at their disposal, they could quite possibly gain the upper hand, even if they had lost some of their own. He looked out the window beside Charles’s shoulder, at the streaks of clouds passing them by. “Get some rest, Charles. A few hours of sleep will do you some good.”

“And what about yourself? It would be cruel to leave you sitting here alone with your thoughts.” He paused and then looked back up at Erik with a grin. “And your cigarette cravings.”

Erik stretched back in his seat. “You can’t tell me that you haven’t been dying for a smoke yourself these past couple of hours.” He fell silent for a moment, his head swimming. The faint hum of sound in the back of his mind that was ever-present when he was in Charles’s company was strangely silent, and it was discomfiting. Perhaps the telepath had overtaxed himself. “Go to sleep, Charles. You don’t want Raven to think that we’ve gone and run you all to hell on top of recent events. I’ll wake you if anything comes up.”


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Last bit of old material. Updates will slow considerably from here on out, as I'm no longer simply editing things, but I'm going to try and keep everything going as quickly as possible.

The quiet thud of shoes tracking along the aisle first caught his attention. Erik’s eyes snapped open and darted about the cabin; for a moment he wasn’t even sure where he was until his eyes landed on Moira. The agent was slowly making her way toward the back, carefully stepping around the men and the gear they had scattered about their feet. She probably wanted to talk to Charles. The other man was pressed up against Erik’s side, his face relaxed in sleep, and Erik felt a twist of disappointment in his gut at the thought of waking him.

“That could be a hazard, you know,” he said softly with a tilt of his head toward the men. “All those things lying around.” At least their pilot had had the common sense to insist on keeping all of their guns secured away, government agents or no. Erik didn’t know much about planes, but he didn’t fancy getting sucked out into the open air should a gun go off at the wrong time in the wrong place.

She shrugged and carefully set herself down on the seat across from them. “As long as they have it secure by the time we come in for a landing, I don’t particularly care.” She brushed away the dark fall of hair from her face and secured it behind her ear. She seemed nervous.

“Something on your mind?”

“The mutants—the ones back at base, Hank and Raven and the rest—they’re secure for now, but as far as my sources can tell me this division has already been dismantled. My superiors only want Ms. Frost for the information she has on Shaw, and I’m sure they will find her abilities useful and will likely keep her contained.” She looked back at Emma’s sleeping form. “Lord knows she’s dangerous enough for it,” she muttered under her breath.

Moira fixed her gaze back on Erik, her expression falling. “But I’m worried about the others, the younger mutants and what is going to happen to them.”

Erik eyed her closely. She was looking most everywhere but directly at him—the floor, her lap, the seat in front of her, and it was quickly becoming distracting. He leaned back into his seat, his face hard and smooth as stone. “You think they’re going to experiment on them.” It wasn’t a question.

“Yes,” she replied, her voice so soft it was almost a whisper. “I do.”

He closed his eyes and tried to will away the memories of tables and straps and cool metal instruments that made everything ache for days on end. He sucked in a deep breath to calm himself. He didn’t need Charles picking up on his distress. “Then what do you propose we do?”

“Send them home. I think that in the frenzy of this disaster we could lose track of a couple of kids. Files are easily lost, and there’s so few people alive right now who know who they really are, it shouldn’t be too difficult to keep them out of government hands.”

“And your superiors? Obviously they know about the mutant project.”

She stiffened in her seat. “I can handle them.”

“Can you? Charles told me about Raven’s little display when you first tried to get this mission off the ground. You think that will be so easily forgotten?”

She fell back against her seat, her face finally showing the weariness coursing through her body. “In the wake of nuclear war with the world’s second largest superpower? Yes.”

The weight at Erik’s side shifted, and he frowned. Charles was waking up. The other man rubbed at his eyes with the heel of his palm, and Erik wasn’t sure if it was to ease in the transition from sleep or if it was an attempt to ward off another headache. He suspected the latter.

“Good morning, Charles. Nice of you to join us.”

He blearily looked over in their direction and startled a bit when he saw Moira. “Moira! What’s—” He paused and looked around the plane for a moment in confusion. Everything was just as still and quiet as before. “What’s going on?”

“Moira and I were having a chat about the children we have waiting for us in Virginia.”

“Has something happened to them?”

Moira shook her head. “Nothing else that we know about.”

“Yet,” Erik added on, and Charles shot him a worried look. He still seemed a bit disoriented, his movements clumsy and weak.

“What do you mean by that?”

“You don’t think those kids are going to stay safe on government property with what has happened with Shaw, do you? Now that the CIA knows we exist,” he shot Moira a look, “and with the children simply lying in wait, they make for perfect lab rats.”

Charles went pale at the thought. He turned to Moira, whose face was just as grim as Erik’s.

“I want to send them home, Charles.”

Silence fell for a moment as Charles gathered his thoughts together. Erik sat perfectly still, shifting his gaze between his two companions and studying their movements. He didn’t trust Moira entirely, but he was fairly certain that they could trust her with this. Charles seemed to trust her enough.

Charles was growing paler as the time ticked away, and Erik could feel a minute trembling running through Charles’s frame from the place where their thighs met on the seat bench. Something was up.

“Charles?” He seemed to break out of his trance at the sound of his name.

“That’s probably for the best. We can contact Sean and Hank’s families, and perhaps arrangements can be made for Alex as far as negotiating the terms of his imprisonment.”

Moira nodded. “I can do that as soon as we land.” She leaned over a bit in her seat, a tiny frown etched across her face. “Charles, are you all right?”

“Fine. I’m fine. Just tired,” he said, all too quickly for Erik’s liking, but it seemed to satisfy Moira.

She stood once more and leaned over Erik to pat Charles lightly on the shoulder with a gentle smile. “You should get some more sleep, then. We land in three hours, so that should get you at least a little bit of time.” And she was gone, weaving her way back up to the front, probably off to discuss their new course of action with her partner. Charles was still shaking beside him, but his hands had migrated up to his forehead.

“Why did you do that?”

Charles cast a hazy blue eye his direction. “Do what exactly, Erik?”

“Lie. You’re obviously not well.” He inspected the other man carefully, taking in his pale complexion, the minute winces of pain whenever he moved, the tremors running through his hands. “You don’t look feverish.”

“It’s a headache, Erik. Nothing more. Just let it go.”

Erik frowned and glanced back behind them. Emma was awake now and watching the two of them like a hawk. It seemed almost as though she could see right through him, and it was deeply unsettling. He leaned in close to Charles and lowered his voice to a near whisper. “Is it her? The telepath?”

Charles flopped back against his seat and closed his eyes, his fingers tangling themselves into his hair. “I don’t know. Probably.”

_You know that’s not true, honey. He was sick long before I came along._

Erik froze in his seat but gave no other indication that he’d heard anything. Charles hadn’t moved; there was no indication that he’d heard a thing. She was right, and that was perhaps was frustrated him the most, even more than Charles's insistence that nothing was wrong and his ensuing silences whenever Erik pushed the topic. Erik straightened up in his seat and broadcast his thoughts back to her as loud as he could. _Then tell me what’s wrong._

Her tone was clipped and cold. She was upset with him. _Why should I?_

He flexed the metal bands still wrapped around her body. _I still have control over you._

_You only think you do._

Erik growled and clenched his fists, holding them tight against his thighs as he tried to ignore the tiny stabbing pricks of pain now radiating out from the back of his skull. It was no use talking to her. She was only toying with him, dangling the answers he wanted but was never going to get from her, no matter how much he threatened.

He closed his eyes and tried to relax. Getting upset wasn't going to change anything. He could deal with this, but only after things had settled down a bit. He would confront Charles after they had taken care of the children and Emma was gone from his sight. Then he would find out just what the hell was going on.

\---

Things happened all too quickly once the plane touched down. They all unloaded onto the tarmac with surprising efficiency, Emma flanked by at least two soldiers at all times. She had hardly taken her eyes off Erik once they were all back on solid ground. She was silent as the grave, both inside his head and out, and it was almost unsettling. He couldn’t feel Charles’s presence either. Perhaps he was getting better at blocking telepathy, though the little needles of pain she’d been pushing into his brain had yet to completely disappear.

“You can release Ms. Frost’s restraints now, Mr. Lehnsherr. We’ll take it from here.” An agent. One of the ones who had come to greet them. The news that they had captured Shaw’s second in command had definitely helped with damage control after Shaw’s attack on the compound.

Erik frowned but did as they asked. The bronze circlets uncurled from around her wrists and throat, and Erik was pleased to see faint red marks marring her perfect white skin where the metal had been. She rubbed faintly at her wrists and glared at him with her cold blue eyes, but her voice remained silent in his head.

“Come along, Ms. Frost.” The agent escorting her placed his hand on her shoulder to guide her to the cluster of black cars waiting to take them away.

“I never said you could touch me,” she snapped, bolder now that her restraints were gone. The agent went completely still for a moment, his eyes glassy and his expression blank, as though in a trance, and he slowly lowered his hand to his side. The soldiers around her jumped to attention, and three guns were trained on her faster than she could blink.

“You shouldn’t do that, Emma,” Charles said softly. Erik had hardly noticed the other man’s presence, but the warm hum of Charles’s telepathy was buzzing at the back of his mind. He realized that he hadn’t felt it in so long that the touch was unfamiliar, alien almost, and it was unsettling.

_At least I still can._

Erik looked down at Charles, at his pale face and shaking hands, and he wondered just who else had heard that. Emma had probably done that on purpose. He lifted his gaze back to the other telepath to find her looking directly at him, her lips upturned in a thin smile. “Remember what I told you, Erik.” It was the first time she’d ever spoken his name aloud and hopefully the last. “I’ll be seeing you around, sugar.”

“Not if I can help it,” Erik muttered back as they led her away.

Charles visibly relaxed the minute she climbed into the car and the door shut behind her. He still wavered a bit where he stood, and it made Erik uneasy. “Are you all right?”

“Better now that she’s gone,” Charles said, exhaling heavily before turning to look at the remaining vehicles parked along the tarmac. Moira was conversing with an agent Erik had never seen before, but she quickly raised her head and gestured for them to come over. “It seems the children’s families have all been contacted,” he murmured softly. He started for the car but lost his balance and stumbled, saved from hitting the pavement only by Erik’s hand on his arm.

“Easy, Charles.”

“Sorry.” He shrugged out of Erik’s grip without a second glance and jogged over to the car, leaving Erik behind. Emma’s words from earlier washed over him and he did his best to ignore the cold, mocking voice repeating on endless loop in his brain.

_He was sick long before I came along._

Moira and Charles were waiting for him. He shook his head and quickened his pace to meet them. This would be sorted out soon enough. Things just had to quiet down a bit first.

\---

It was one thing hearing about the damage Shaw had done to the facility and another thing entirely to see it. The building looked to have sunken in on itself, almost as though it had melted. Chunks of fallen concrete littered the property; the metal frame of Darwin’s yellow taxi was wrapped around a particularly large piece of rubble, a grim reminder of their loss.

Raven and the others were lined up along the sidewalk, seated at the remains of the thick concrete walls that encircled the building. Charles had bolted from the car before it had even come to a complete stop, Erik and Moira hot on his heels.

Charles ran up to meet his sister and wrapped her up in his arms as soon as he reached her. She melted into the embrace. Erik could see from the looks on the kids’ faces and their sad, defeated postures that this had hit them hard. He turned to survey the damage and the suits bustling around the compound. At least they seemed to have removed all of the dead, though the large bloody stains littering the sidewalks stood out as a testament to what had happened.

Protests rose up from the group and Erik turned his attention back to them. The redhead gestured to the young man to his left, Alex, the convict. “He’s not going back to prison.”

Moira had already squared that away. The boy was getting a reduced sentence or something of that nature for ‘good behavior’ or ‘service to his country.’ Something along those lines. All courtesy of the CIA. Of course, none of the children were privy to this information just yet. Erik stayed quiet, wondering what other reasons they could think of to try and salvage this little mission, and then Alex brought up Muñoz, their dead compatriot. They all grew quiet at that. Erik wasn’t particularly saddened by the man’s death—he hadn’t really known the man, and really, it was simply one more casualty in the fight against Shaw—but the children still seemed shaken up by the loss.

“Darwin’s dead, Charles, and we can’t even bury him.” Raven was almost pleading with her brother. Erik could hear the anger laced through her tone, buried under the blank shock of grief.

“We can avenge him,” Erik offered without hesitation. All eyes were on him now, almost as though they were shocked by the very idea. Erik wasn’t sure why the thought was so farfetched. Revenge was one of the best possible motivators he knew, and this only heightened their desire to hunt down Shaw. Anything to aid in finding and killing that man was a plus in his book.

Charles stormed past him. He seemed to have gained his footing since finding his sister unharmed, though he was still far too pale to be well. “Erik, a word please.” And he followed, even though he knew exactly where this was going.

“They’re just kids,” Charles hissed once they were out of range, and Erik felt his anger rising at Charles’s naivety. Erik had been far younger when reality had come crashing down on him. It had to happen to everyone eventually.

“No, they _were_ kids.” He gestured back at the group but kept his voice low. “Shaw has his army. We need ours.”

He could see Charles’s resolve crumbling as he looked back toward the group. His shoulders dropped, and Erik knew he had won. It didn’t feel as satisfying as he’d hoped. Charles had given in far too easily.

“All right,” Charles whispered with a minute shake of his head. Erik followed him as he walked back over to the others. He straightened a bit and drew his arms in around himself. He didn’t look nearly as collected as he had even a few minutes before, but his voice was calm and steady in a way his body was not. “We’re going to do this together. All of us.”

Hank spoke up for the first time since they’d arrived. “But we don’t have anywhere to go.” He looked back toward the ruined building behind them and then directly at Moira. “I doubt they’re going to reopen the department after what’s happened, and even if they did, it’s not safe. Shaw will find us.”

“I know where we can go,” Charles said softly before he too turned to Moira. “Can you get us use of one of the cargo vans? I doubt we’ll all fit into one of the cars otherwise.”

She gave a sharp nod of her head and a tiny smile. “I’ll see what I can do.”

\---

Erik had always known that Charles had come from money, but it still odd to have physical proof of his wealth, and to be living _here_ of all places—it seemed unreal. Still, it was generous of his companion to let them have free run of his estate for the time being. He hadn’t been using it anyway, hadn’t actually been here in years if Erik had heard him correctly.

He stared out onto the grounds from his perch at the window and wondered just whose room this had been before their little group had come to settle here. Probably no one’s. As far as he knew, Charles’s household had only had three, maybe four people in it at any given time, though he had mentioned a ‘Cain’ in passing once or twice before. A stepbrother perhaps or a younger half-brother, since Raven didn’t seem very fond of the name either and Charles had no full-blood siblings so far as Erik knew. Either way, there was little need for a place as big as this with so few people. Charles was putting it to good use now.

He sighed and wrapped himself around his knees, wishing that sleep would finally come to him. The insomnia was bad tonight.

He thought back to the Soviet Union, to Emma and her smug comments.

_Your friend isn’t telling you everything._

_He was sick long before I came along._

She hadn’t been lying. Charles had been sick back when they were still recruiting, had been unsteady and pale, vomiting and shaky for weeks now. Ms. Frost’s presence might have exacerbated it, but she most definitely wasn’t the cause.

Erik looked over at the clock sitting over on the table by his bed. It was late. Charles was probably asleep. He unfolded his legs and took one last look out at the moonlit grounds. But the kids were probably asleep as well. What better time than now to get to the bottom of this?

A sudden thud outside his door brought him to full attention, and he was on his feet faster than he could blink.

“Who’s out there?” There was no answer, just some shuffling coming from the hallway.

He made his way over to the door, but it swung open before he could get there. It was Charles, still in his clothes from before. The other man was slumped against the doorknob, his hands gripping it so hard his fingers had gone white, like he would fall if he let go, and his upper lip was smeared red with blood. More of it was streaming from his nose in earnest. His blue eyes were glassy and unfocused, but the panic was clear, both in his face and his voice.

“Charles?”

“Erik, Erik, I—” He stumbled over to him and gripped his shoulders like a lifeline. His hands were shaking madly as his eyes searched Erik’s face, and Erik felt his heart jump into his throat at the desperation he saw there. “Erik, it’s too quiet. I can’t—you’re not there, even when I touch you. There’s nothing…”

“Charles, what are you talking about?”

“You’re not there. In my head. Nobody is.” He swallowed and glanced around the room like a wild animal caught in a trap. Blood was still pouring freely from his nose, staining the carpet and collar of his shirt with tiny dots of red. “Erik, I think—I think my powers are gone.”

\---

Erik froze. He couldn’t tell if his mind had simply gone blank from the shock of it all, or if there were too many thoughts racing around in his head at once, effectively drowning all of them into an unpleasant static. Either way, Charles was not making any sense. “What?”

“My powers—Erik, I can’t. I can’t hear you. Or the children. I don’t—I don’t understand what’s happening.” Charles was stumbling a bit over his words, almost like he couldn’t remember the order in which they were supposed to go, and his voice grew softer and softer as he spoke until he trailed off into silence. His eyes were growing more and more unfocused, and his grip on Erik’s shirt grew looser the longer they stood there, Charles’s weight coming to rest uncomfortably against Erik’s chest as his legs failed him.

Erik growled in frustration and moved his hands up to Charles’s shoulders. He pushed the other man back a few centimeters to get a better look at his face. He was still as pale as ever, and his eyes were wandering around the room in a haze of confusion, almost like Charles wasn’t even sure where he was even though this was his _own house_ , and damn it all, he was still bleeding like a stuck pig. Erik lifted one of Charles’s arms and draped it across his shoulders while he leaned down a bit and grabbed Charles by the waist. “Erik, what—”

“Lean on me.” He was looking forward, out into the darkened hallway, and praying that everyone else was well and truly asleep. It wouldn’t for any of them to see Charles like this, especially not his sister. “We need to get you cleaned up. Then you can tell me what in the hell is going on.”

There were a few perks to being older than everyone else in their little band of misfits, the private bathroom attached to his bedroom being one of them. The two of them slowly staggered over to the open door of the bathroom, and Erik flicked on the light. His eyes quickly swept over the space before landing on the toilet. He grimaced, turning to look at Charles. “You’re not nauseous, are you?”

Charles blinked at him, more dazed than he had been even a minute ago, and Christ, he was still bleeding. “No, I don’t think so,” he mumbled softly.

Erik looked back at the room, indecision warring within him. He didn’t particularly feel like taking chances. He dragged Charles over to the bath and leaned him up against the porcelain rim. There were neatly folded towels bundled up underneath the sink. Erik had no idea how long they’d been there, but considering the amount of dust there had been on most everything else in the house, quite some time. He gingerly pulled a small one out and thrust it under the flowing faucet of the sink as quickly as possible to avoid throwing dust into the air. Charles looked to be having enough difficulty breathing at the moment without him going and screwing things up.

The fabric absorbed the water quickly. He twisted off the water and turned to Charles, who seemed to be focusing all of his energy on remaining upright. His fingers had smeared tiny streaks of red across the pristine white tiles. Erik’s frown deepened. He hadn’t noticed Charles touching his face earlier, and he only seemed to be bleeding from the nose as far as he could tell. Erik looked at his shirt sleeves to find traces of blood there, too, and he sighed. Charles must have forgotten to wipe his hands clean in his haste to get to Erik’s room. He crouched down low to look his companion in the eye.

“Charles.”

The sound of his name drew the other man’s attention. Erik held out the towel for Charles to take, his gaze never wavering. “Here.”

Charles grinned tiredly at him, morbid around all the blood still painted across his face, and Erik was stricken by the odd sort of desperation he saw in those blue eyes. Charles never reached for the towel. “I must look a sight, don’t I?”

“A bit.” Erik settled himself into a more comfortable position and grabbed Charles by the chin, pulling him forward just enough to wipe at his face with the towel. Charles squeezed his eyes shut against the light but didn’t struggle. It made something twist uncomfortably in Erik’s gut to see his friend so complacent. Charles could certainly be a pushover, but he didn’t bend easily. Not this easily, anyway. He was too proud.

Erik dabbed at the drying blood clinging to his chin. “At least you’re calmer now.”

Charles didn’t respond, but Erik could see his hands tightening into fists against the floor. The bleeding hadn’t completely stopped, but it had slowed. He reached forward and grabbed one of Charles’s hands and held it up against the towel to keep it in place. “Hold that.” He glanced up at the lights and back again at Charles, noting the tension in his frame. His head was tilted back to rest against the tub, but his eyes remained shut almost like to was too much of an effort to open them again. “Charles.”

“What, Erik?” Even muffled by the towel over his face, Erik could pick out the irritation in Charles’s voice. Anger. That was good. That meant the panic from before was gone (or at least lessened) and Charles was returning to normal. He smiled a little at that, feeling himself relaxing in spite of everything. He studied Charles’s face, the bloody towel, the bright lights bouncing off the tiles and realization dawned on him.

“Are the lights bothering you?”

Charles cracked open an eye at that. “What?”

“I asked if the lights were bothering you. You look like you might have another headache.”

“Yes, Erik,” he said with a sigh, pulling the towel away to inspect it once more. The bleeding seemed to have stopped. For now, anyway. “In answer to both of your questions. They are, and I do.”

Erik lifted himself to his feet and flicked off the lights. The bright reflections off the white floor and walls disappeared into shadow, the only light to be had now that of the small lamp at Erik’s bedside table in the other room. Charles allowed the darkness to wash over them for a moment before slowly raising his head to meet Erik’s gaze. Erik crouched down low again, brushing a few strands of hair away from Charles’s forehead where they fell into his eyes.

“Better?”

Charles recoiled from Erik’s touch, curling back toward the bath and drawing his eyes down to the floor, refusing to meet Erik’s gaze. “Loads.”

Erik could feel his impatience building, rising up in his chest like a flame. Charles was sick, and it was serious if this little incident was anything to go by. He had been hiding from him for too long, and it was time for this to stop. “What’s going on, Charles?” _Why won’t you tell me anything?_ He fought to keep his worry and anger from bleeding through into his voice, but it wasn’t very effective, if the look on Charles’s face was anything to go by.

Charles tensed up, and for a brief moment Erik thought he was going to tell him that he was perfectly fine, that he should stop worrying, that this was just a big overreaction to a nosebleed, but he didn’t. He sagged against the bathtub and crumpled the soiled towel in his lap. Shadows danced across his face, shifting with every new emotion that etched itself into Charles’s forehead. Finally, he looked up, looking resigned and tired and more than a little frightened in the darkness.

“I don’t know.”

\---

Erik frowned and settled his knees down onto the floor so he could get closer to Charles. It was hard to see him in the dark. He reached out and gently grabbed the telepath’s chin to pull him in close. The bleeding seemed to have stopped completely for the time being, but Erik wanted to keep an eye on it anyway. Nosebleeds that severe were never good, especially if Charles hadn’t broken something from a fall or a hit to the face of some sort. The other man certainly didn’t look injured, and that only made this whole situation more uncomfortable for him. Injuries he could deal with. He didn’t know how to correct whatever this was.

He let out a puff of air and released his companion, too distracted to notice that Charles hadn’t fought him in the slightest, and placed his hands on his thighs. “Well, you don’t seem hurt.”

“I’m not injured, Erik.” He looked up, and Erik was struck by just how blue Charles’s eyes were, even in the dark, Perhaps it was a secondary mutation, like a marker to show that yes, he could read and control your every thought. Charles squeezed his eyes shut and propped his head back against the bathtub once more. “But I do hurt, if the pounding in my head is anything to go by.”

“Do you need something for that. Like…” he fought for the word. Regardless of how many injuries he’d treated over the years, he was still a bit at a loss about painkillers. “Ah, aspirin?”

“No,” Charles mumbled, not bothering to move his head. “I just need to sit here for a while longer.”

Erik shuffled across the floor to sit beside Charles. Their shoulders brushed together as he settled in, jostling Charles a bit, but he said nothing. He was probably glad for the company.

They sat there in silence. Erik ran over the events of the past few weeks in his head, trying to make sense of this. Charles was sick, that much was obvious. He’d been sick for a while now, but Erik couldn’t for the life of him pinpoint when Charles had started acting funny. He vaguely remembered Charles losing his control for a few hours in some shit hole motel in the middle of nowhere, projecting and then losing track of the mutant they’d been following. And then there was the brief meeting he’d had with Charles before they’d left for the Soviet Union. He’d been bleeding then, too. Erik’s frown deepened.

“Erik?”

“What?”

“You’re too quiet. What are you thinking about?” Charles murmured sleepily.

Erik let out a breathy chuckle. What a ridiculous question for Charles to ask. He was a telepath, for god’s sake. He should be more than capable—unless…

Charles’s words from when he’d first stumbled into Erik’s room played themselves on endless repeat in Erik’s mind until they had almost lost all meaning. His breath caught tight in his chest, and his throat closed up like a clam as realization hit him.

_It’s too quiet._

_You’re not there. Nobody is._

Charles couldn’t hear him. Charles couldn’t pick out his thoughts, and they were only a few centimeters away from one another; hell, their shoulders were touching. He hadn’t been exaggerating things in his panic. Erik sucked in a deep breath and tried to rationalize his thoughts, but nothing was working.

_Erik, I think—I think my powers are gone._

Erik tried his best to swallow his rising anxiety as he turned to the man beside him. “Charles,” he choked out, trying to capture his attention, but even that had sounded too much like a desperate gurgle to his ears. “Charles,” he tried again, a little steadier this time.

“Mmm?”

“You can still hear my thoughts, can’t you?”

“What are you talking about?” Charles’s voice was uncomfortably soft. The gentle anger, the irritation from earlier was still there with no trace of panic to be found (Erik was panicking enough for the both of them now, thanks), but Charles seemed to be slurring his words again, which was worrying. Erik looked over at Charles and studied his face, squinting hard against the dark. He wasn’t bleeding again, so that was good, but he was nodding off now and nowhere near as responsive as he should have been. Erik scowled and slid around to face Charles, grabbing the other man’s wrists and shaking him awake.

“What on earth are you doing, Erik?” Charles grumbled. He squinted angrily at Erik but didn’t try to pull away.

“You said that your powers were gone. Earlier, when you came in here. You said they were gone.”

“I did?” Charles seemed genuinely confused. He’d forgotten a conversation they’d had only minutes ago. Erik fought to keep his breathing under control.

“Yes. Yes, you did,” he ground out. “Now read my mind.”

“Was I exaggerating? That sounds like something I’d do, exaggerate. Raven always makes sure to keep me in check when I start doing that.”

“Damn it, Charles, focus!” He shook his wrists again, drawing Charles’s full attention to his face. He locked eyes with him, his expression deadly serious. “Read my mind. Tell me about something, anything, that you find in there.”

“I don’t really see the point in—”

“Do it,” he commanded. His tone left no room for argument. Erik’s grip tightened on his wrists. Charles was evading him; Erik couldn’t tell if he was doing it on purpose or if he really was as out of it as he seemed. “Do it, Charles. Read my mind.”

Charles scoffed at his dramatics but shook his left hand out of Erik’s grasp. He brought it up to his temple and pressed the pads of his fingers into the skin there, the same way Erik had seen him do a thousand times before, and he closed his eyes. To concentrate, Erik assumed.

After a few silent moments, Charles drew his lower lip in between his teeth and screwed his eyes even more tightly shut. His breath was quickening, and Erik was starting to grow worried again.

“Charles?”

“I can’t—” Charles started. He flexed the fingers of his other hand, and Erik let him go. He immediately reached out and grabbed the hem of Erik’s shirt, like he needed the physical contact to be certain that Erik was really there. He opened his eyes and searched Erik’s face. “I can’t find you.” He deflated and brought both of his hands to lay against the curve of Erik’s jaw; his thumbs gently brushed the stubble covering Erik’s skin, like he didn’t know quite what to do with it.

Something like a soft chuckle escaped his mouth, tinged with sadness and some other emotion that Erik couldn’t place. “It’s like I’m dreaming. I have to be dreaming because you wouldn’t let me touch you like this if it wasn’t all in my head.”

“Charles.” Erik pulled Charles’s hands away from his face. “You’re bleeding.” Another line of red was making its way down Charles’s face to pool at the place where his lips came together and stain his teeth crimson.

Charles swiped a hand across his upper lip and studied the dark smear left behind on his skin. “Oh. That, that probably isn’t good.”

Erik kept his silence. He reached down and grabbed the soiled towel from Charles’s lap, handing it to the other man and guiding it to his face. “Just keep that there. I’ll get another one.” He looked down at Charles’s clothes, at the dark shadows spotting his shirt that had nothing to do with the lighting. “And something else for you to wear, I guess.”

He lifted himself from the floor and looked back down at the man on the floor. He looked so vulnerable, so unlike the Charles he’d come to know these past few weeks, and it was unsettling. He swallowed and looked briefly to the door, praying that the other occupants of the house were still asleep. “Just stay. There. I’ll be right back.”

“All right,” Charles whispered back. “All right.” He sounded tired again, like he was going to fall over and lose consciousness the second Erik turned his back. Erik cursed softly under his breath. He really shouldn’t be leaving Charles alone, but he couldn’t leave him like this either. He would only be gone for a few minutes.

“I’ll be right back,” he repeated before slipping out of the bathroom and making his way toward the hall. He just needed to trace their steps from this afternoon when Raven was parading them around the house and find Charles’s room. It shouldn’t be that difficult a task so long as Moira and the children were still in their beds. The last thing he wanted to do was reach for an explanation to something he didn’t yet understand himself. He crept out of his room into the darkened manor, keeping his eyes fixed straight ahead so he wouldn’t have to see the small, spotted trail of blood leading up to his door.


	4. Chapter 4

Erik felt lost roaming the dark, antique halls of the Xavier estate. Dust and cobwebs loomed down from near every corner of the house, all evidence that the place had been abandoned some time ago, although Erik couldn’t possibly fathom why. Charles had had no need for stealth, no agenda to complete, and yet he had run all the way to Oxford, dragging his sister along with him, leaving nothing but this dusty monument to their childhood behind. Erik could sometimes see minute clouds of fine, powdery dust rise up around his feet when he passed through a patch of moonlight, invisible in the dark. He squinted against the darkness of the hall, trying to figure out exactly which room was supposed to belong to Charles. It was hard to make out which dots on the carpet were supposed to be part of the complicated pattern and which were the drying beads of Charles’s blood.

He scowled and scuffed his shoes along the old, fraying fibers, trying to ward away the image of Charles curled up on his bathroom floor as he stumbled through the halls. A shirt. He just needed a shirt that would fit Charles and then he could make his way back to the man. Get him cleaned up. Get this whole thing sorted out.

He lifted his gaze and paused in front of a grand oak door. It looked much the same as the other bedroom doors in the house, but this seemed about right. Erik pushed open the door with the flat of his hand, the skin of his palm hard on the old, carved wood. Even if this was the wrong room, there was sure to be something in here he could use, or perhaps he’d simply admit defeat and let Charles borrow one of the few shirts he had stashed away in his suitcase. Anything of his would be too long for Charles, but it was late, and Erik was tired of looking for clues in the dark. He opened the door to soft moonlight spilling over the furniture and a telltale shape on the bed that let him know he was far from alone.

“Erik? What are you doing in my room?” He froze at the sound of Raven’s voice before quickly turning around and closing the door behind him with a mumbled apology. Wrong room. Damn it. He really should have paid more attention when they made rooming assignments.

Raven’s soft footsteps drew ever closer, and Erik sighed as he released the doorknob from his grip. Oh well. At least Raven would be able to help him find Charles’s room, as much as he didn’t want anyone else to know about Charles’s situation, least of all his sister.

“Erik?” Raven gently pulled the door open, and Erik stepped back as she emerged from her bedroom. She seemed to be wearing nothing but a soft white robe and her human disguise, artificial blonde hair falling too perfectly into place for someone who had just woken up. “What’s going on?”

He turned away from her, refusing to be embarrassed about his mistake. “I was looking for Charles’s room.”

She sleepily rubbed a hand over her eye, trying to wipe away her tiredness in favor of her budding curiosity over Erik’s mysterious appearance at her door. “Why? It’s the middle of the night.”

“I know. It’s important.” He looked away, eying the doors on either side of Raven’s room. “Do you know where it is?”

“Of course I do,” she replied, not bothering to hide the mocking tone in her voice. “I grew up here, after all.”

Erik bristled at her cheek. “That doesn’t mean he chose the same room.”

She only rolled her eyes. Really, even though they had traveled together for all this time, it was quite obvious that Erik knew nothing about her brother. “Yes, it does. Charles is a creature of habit. He always tries to keep things the same unless he absolutely has to. That’s just the way he is.”

“I don’t really care, Raven. Can you just show me where his room is?”

She crossed her arms over her chest and narrowed her yellow eyes into a piercing glare. “Why?”

“It’s—”

“Important. Yeah, sure.” She rolled her eyes again and leaned up against the doorframe. “It’s the room at the end of the hall, to your left. Charles and I used to sneak into each other’s rooms at night through the servant’s entrances. If he’s awake, he should let you in.”

Erik thought back to Charles crouched on the floor of his bathroom, a bloody towel pressed to his face like a kerchief, and fought to keep his face smooth. It wouldn’t do to worry Raven. Not now, not over Charles, especially when the memory of losing the other two mutants from their little group was still fresh in her mind. He turned to walk away but was stopped by a gentle pull at the sleeve of his shirt.

“Erik.” Her voice was soft, far gentler than he’d ever heard it, and it gave him pause. “Everything’s okay, right?”

He hesitated for a brief moment before shrugging out of her grasp. “Everything’s fine, Raven,” he lied smoothly. Her skepticism was written all over her face, and Erik sighed, rubbing a hand through his hair and turning away so he wouldn’t have to look her in the eye. “Just go back to bed. I’ll see you in the morning.” That, at least, would be true. He had no intentions of leaving until he got some answers from Charles.

Raven still seemed unconvinced and perhaps a little hurt from how easily he dismissed her, but she did as she was told, turning away from him and slipping back inside her room, clutching the front of her robe together. Once her door was fully closed, the deadlatch firmly seated in place, Erik let out a breath of relief and made for the end of the hall, toward the room Raven had singled out as her brother’s.

Charles’s room was not quite what Erik had been expecting. For one thing, the place was immaculate, save for the rumpled bed sheets, but even those looked to have been haphazardly tugged back into place. It was odd, considering how disorganized Charles had been during their trips across the country. Something about being in his childhood home reviving old manners long forgotten, perhaps. Any child raised in a place like this had to have had some sort of ‘gentlemanly’ decorum instilled into them, even with things typically left to the help. Still, it was mildly disconcerting to see the man’s personal space so sterile, like he was getting ready to leave at any moment or fade away into the many halls.

Erik made his way over to the old, intricately carved chest of drawers and pulled a drawer open at random to find neat stacks of folded shirts. Any of them would do. He grabbed one and draped it over his arm. The stillness, the emptiness of the place was disquieting. Erik quickly rose to his feet and left; Charles was waiting for him.

The door to his room was still ajar when Erik finally found his way back. He silently cursed himself for not paying more attention to the layout of the place when Charles and Raven had led them on their little ‘tour.’ He’d never been so careless; he was getting sloppy, complacent. The very idea put him even more on edge, and he had to stop himself from running to the bathroom to get to Charles and demand answers. The telepath had to have done something to him. There was no other explanation for it.

The bathroom was still dark when he walked inside. Charles was still on the floor, his back pressed against the side of the bathtub, but he made no move to acknowledge Erik’s presence.

“Charles?”

Erik crouched down low, letting the shirt around his arm fall to the floor, and gently shook the man’s shoulder. “Charles.” No response. Charles was too far gone in sleep. Erik huffed out a frustrated sigh. He couldn’t just leave the other man on the floor for the night. 

He turned back to the other man and leaned in close, lightly grabbing Charles’s chin to inspect his face. No fresh blood. That was good, even if Charles did look a mess with his puffy red eyes and pale cheeks, his forehead drawn together in a frown even in sleep. Erik grabbed the rust-stained towel that had fallen from Charles’s limp fingers and rose to his feet. First, he needed to get Charles cleaned up a bit.

He made for the sink and twisted the tap, leaning his hip against the counter as he waited for the water to heat up a little. The blood stains might not ever come out of the towel should he do this, but Charles’s comfort was more important than some silly little piece of cloth that probably hadn’t seen the light of day in years. As soon as the water was warm, he trust the towel under the stream. Thin, rusty trails of water bled through his fingers and down the drain. Blood. Charles’s blood. He tried not to think about it.

Once the towel was sufficiently wet, he wrung it out, ignoring the reddish splotches of color painting the fabric, and turned off the tap. He lowered himself back down onto the floor and gently wiped the blood from Charles’s face. The other man remained silent and still as the dead, save for the soft in and out of his breath.

When he finally had Charles’s face clear, Erik tossed the towel aside—he’d deal with it in the morning—and slid his arm around Charles’s back, the other settling in under the man’s knees. He lifted Charles from the floor, staggering a bit at the dead weight in his arms. It felt like ages since he had last carried a body. Usually it was better to leave them where they lay. Let someone else figure it out. But this was Charles, not some Nazi scum killed by Erik’s hand. His mind scrambled with what to do.

Bed. Charles should be put to bed.

Erik trudged out of the bathroom and made a beeline for the plush, overlarge bed in his room. It was still immaculate, un-slept-in. The thing was far too soft. It put Erik on edge, rather than relax him. His mind flashed briefly back to Charles’s room, to the hastily made bed and neat, orderly bookshelves. It seemed like he was not the only one having trouble relaxing in this place.

He laid Charles down and drew up the edge of the comforter, draping it over the man’s clothed form as best as he could. He wasn’t exactly sure how Charles liked to sleep, even after traveling with the man all that time, but it was uncomfortable enough just putting him to bed. Changing him into clothes Erik didn’t even have was out of the question, and besides all that, picking the man up again was not exactly something he was anxious to do. This would have to suffice.

Once Charles was well and fully settled, Erik felt a little at a loss. Exhaustion was slowly creeping up on him, and he cast a glance at his now occupied bed. He had no compunctions about sleeping in the same place as someone else, though he hadn’t done it for years and the thought of it put him a bit on edge. Sleep was when a person was most vulnerable, after all. For a brief moment his mind flooded with the thought of leaving, running away from this man, his little band of misfits, the CIA, all of it; Charles was powerless right now. There was no longer any quiet, looming, intriguing threat of losing his free will hanging over his head. But that was just it. He couldn’t just leave, because Charles may well be in trouble, and, damn it all, Erik had gotten attached. This new development needed to be addressed, answered.

His eyes slid over to the plush (ugly) armchair that someone must have thought matched the opulent décor. While finding another room, another bed, was tempting, he didn’t want to leave Charles alone again. The man had come to Erik, after all, and Erik wanted answers as soon as he could get them. Besides, it was dreadfully late, and he was tired. Finding another room meant potentially running into Raven or one of the others, and he had had more than enough of other people for the night.

Erik let his shoulders drop as he made his way over to the chair. Leaving it where it was was out of the question. Erik was a light sleeper, always had been (had always needed to be, ever since the trains had come for him and his parents), but it couldn’t hurt to be closer to the bed when Charles woke up.

He dragged the heavy wooden thing over to the side of the bed, cursing it all the way. “The things I do for you, Charles,” he murmured quietly into the stillness as he tugged the chair into place. Most of the noise from its feet sliding across the floor had been absorbed by the plush carpet under his feet. Hopefully anyone who might still be awake hadn’t heard him, or, if they had, thought nothing of it. It was none of their business what he did.

Erik sank down onto the cushions and stretched his legs out in front of him. He stared at Charles’s peaceful face, and his face melted into a frown.

_It’s too quiet._

It shouldn’t be this way. Charles wasn’t supposed to be like this, and it wasn’t supposed to be Emma Frost, of all people, who was the only person who had a clue as to what was going on.

_You’re not there. Nobody is._

Charles couldn’t be losing his powers; it was impossible, wasn’t it?

Erik lifted his hand from the armrest and inspected it like he’d never seen it before. His eyes traced the fine lines crisscrossing one another on the plane of his palm in a pattern he’d never quite been able to understand. So much power hidden right there under his skin, just like Alex had buried in his chest and Charles had tucked away in his head.

“Are you unique, Chares?” he murmured aloud.

_I can’t—_

_I can’t find you._

“Or are all of our abilities fleeting?” His mind flashed back to Auschwitz, to the horrible moment when his parents were wrenched from him at the gate, and those spires had first bent to his will. He saw the bell on Schmidt’s, Shaw’s—whatever the hell that demon wanted to call himself—desk. Helmets crushing men’s skulls into pulp. The coin in his pocket felt heavy. A cold chill ran through his body, and Erik closed his hand into a tightly balled fist.

_Erik, I think—I think my powers are gone._

Would this gift of his, this curse, be taken from him like everything else in his life?

He looked back at Charles, something in him yearning for that strange brush at the back of his mind that he’d always felt in Charles’s presence, but there was nothing. Would Erik lose this man, too? Perhaps he’d already lost him. Erik sunk down low into the chair and let the tension run out of his body like water. He would keep his vigil tonight, and Charles would give him answers in the morning.

The silence was overwhelming.

\---

Erik woke with a jolt, his body going completely rigid before the dull ache from the stiffness in his limbs brought him back to reality. The chair. That’s right. He’d slept in the chair next to Charles’s bed. Charles. He straightened, stretching out the sore muscles of his back as he did. Thin rays of sunlight draped over him from the space between the curtains on the window. He’d slept far longer—and deeper—than he’d intended. Erik focused his eyes on the bed in front of him, and he scowled. It was immaculate, sheets and covers pulled into place like no one had ever been there.

Erik pushed himself out of the chair, stumbling a bit on unsteady legs until he found his footing. He couldn’t hear water running, so that ruled out the shower, the sink, the toilet, even before he turned to see the bathroom door open. He stalked over to the room anyway. It too had been cleaned. The shirt and towel he’d left on the floor last night were gone. There were no small dried smears of blood dotting the floor. Nothing. Something tightened in Erik’s chest, and he felt himself flush with anger.

It was obvious what Charles was doing: he was trying to erase last night, like it was nothing more than a bad dream. A mistake. Too bad it was Erik he’d come to. Erik wasn’t exactly known to let things go, especially not when the consequences were so high. Was Emma right? Was Charles losing his telepathy permanently? Would everyone else start losing their powers? Or was everything last night (and every night since Charles got sick, really) a fluke? Was Charles the only one who was sick? If so, why?

His head was spinning, and suddenly the urge to find Charles overwhelmed him. The man had robbed Erik of his chance to get the answers he needed, and that was unacceptable. Erik turned on his heel and sped down the hall. Even through his distraction, Erik had made note of the route to Charles’s room last night. He made it to the door at the end of the hall, the one Raven had pointed out last night, and pushed his way inside without so much as a knock to announce his presence.

It was empty.

The clumsily-made bed from last night was now crisp and clean, just as Erik’s had been. So. Charles had come back here at some point. Erik snarled and slammed the door behind him.

“Erik?”

His gaze snapped up to see Raven standing outside her room. She too looked fresh and clean, hidden away under her little blonde disguise that just made him even angrier. There she was, hiding, flaunting her powers in the worst way, when Charles could very well have lost his.

“Where’s your brother?” he snarled.

She frowned at his tone and crossed her arms in front of her chest, her stance growing hard and defensive. “Charles?”

“Who else would I be talking about?”

“As far as I know, he’s in his room, but since your lovely little display with his door has obviously proven me wrong, I assume he’s downstairs with whoever else is up, probably having breakfast. What the hell is all this about, Erik? You barge into my room last night looking for Charles, and here you are, still prowling around looking for him. What’s going on?”

“It’s nothing.” He turned away from her and made for the stairs, but her sharp tug on his sleeve kept him in place. “Let go of me, Raven.”

“Not until you tell me what’s going on!”

Erik pried her fingers away from his shirt but didn’t let go of her hand. He squeezed her fingers tight in his own, and she winced at the pressure. “You want to know what’s going on? Well, so do I, and the only person who can tell us is Charles. So butt out.”

She wrenched her hand away and held it close to her chest as he turned away. “You’re an asshole, you know that?” she called after him.

He didn’t bother to answer her as he made for the stairs. If Charles was on the ground floor, there were only a few places he could be, especially if he was having breakfast (pretending nothing was wrong) like Raven had said.

Faint voices were coming from the kitchen, and he quickened his step until the room came into view. It was quite picturesque: sunlight beaming in from the windows strewn about the walls, the cutlery that had been laid out on the kitchen table catching the light. Hank could be seen out of the corner of his eye puttering around near the stove, frying eggs, from the smell of it. Sean was leaning on the counter, talking to him while he cooked, and Alex was watching them both, a white ceramic mug cradled in his hands. A rare moment of serenity; perhaps Darwin’s death and the reality of their situation had sunken in and calmed them all down a bit.

And there was Charles, sitting at the dressed kitchen table, talking to Moira like nothing was wrong, his own steaming mug of coffee sitting in front of him. He looked a little worse for wear—skin a bit pale and drawn, dark circles underneath his eyes, shoulders slouched, hair combed a little less than perfect—but his demeanor was relaxed and cheerful, as it usually was, and no one seemed to notice the slight changes to the man that were putting Erik on edge. Erik walked into the room and sat down beside Moira, startling the woman a bit at his sudden closeness. He’d never exactly shown her much fondness before, and she had been the same, but their general dislike for one another had never been so far as outright hostility.

“Erik,” Charles said with a tired smile. “Lovely to see you this morning. Did you sleep well?” He gave no indication that he knew Erik was wearing the same clothes as yesterday, something Erik rarely did when he had the luxury of changing.

“You know that I didn’t.” Moira frowned at that, but said nothing, her gaze flicking back and forth between the two men as if hoping she could pick up on the silent exchange they were most assuredly having under her nose. She, of course, couldn’t know about Charles not being able to read him last night. She couldn’t know that Charles may well be just as human as she was at this very moment.

“Well, the beds here certainly take some getting used to.” Charles’s smile was a little more strained now, but he was giving nothing away.

Erik frowned. _Sleeping in chairs takes more time to get used to than over-soft beds, Charles._ He sent out his thoughts as loudly as he could, but Charles made no sign that he heard Erik at all.

“Moira and I were just discussing something you may find of interest, actually.” Charles lifted his mug to his lips but set it back down without taking a drink, his eyes widening. “Oh, where are my manners? Would you like some coffee? I’m sure there’s a little left in the pot.” He sat up a bit and looked over at the percolator on the counter. “If not, Sean would probably be more than willing to make more.” 

Erik could feel the coffee weighing down the middle of the metal pot, and shook his head. “There’s something there. I’ll get it myself.” Fine, Charles. Two could play this game. Erik pushed back from the table and went to grab one of the white ceramic mugs sitting on the counter near the percolator, keeping his ears open for anything suspicious that Charles and Moira might say in his brief absence.

While he was up, the soft thud of feet caught his attention, and he turned his gaze to the door. Ah, Raven. She still looked upset from their earlier confrontation, but she said nothing. Instead, she walked past him, head held defiantly high, and went straight for the table, firmly planting herself next to Charles.

“What’s wrong, Raven?” he heard Charles ask. “I know mornings were never your strong suit, but—”

“Drop it, Charles.”

Erik came back to the table with a full mug of coffee and regained his seat next to Moira. The heat of Raven’s stare was boring holes into him, but he ignored her, turning his full attention back to Charles.

“Right, well, Raven and the others might want to hear this too, I suppose.” Charles cleared his throat, and the room went quiet save for the quiet sizzle of the eggs frying on the stove. Charles’s voice was louder when he continued, speaking to the entire room, rather than just the people across from him. “As you well know, we have a serious threat on our hands by the way of Sebastian Shaw.” He caught the eyes of everyone in the room after he spoke that name; the gravity of it all bearing down on them. “We don’t know where he is, but we,” he nodded lightly at Erik and Moira, “know what he’s planning.”

Charles took a breath, and Erik could almost feel the waves of exhaustion seeping off of him. Was Charles projecting? Could anyone else feel that? He cast a quick glance at the women at the table. Both looked a little worn, upset. Maybe he was affecting them, too. Maybe Charles wasn’t too far gone yet. Or maybe it was wishful thinking.

“He wants to start the next Great War,” Erik cut in before Charles could continue. “Except this time, he wants mutants, himself in particular, at the heart of it all.”

“Yes, thank you, Erik. Shaw plans for complete domination and the extermination of all who oppose him, which is, essentially, the entire human race. From what we can tell, he plans to use the tensions between the United States and the Soviet Union to have them both make good on their threats for nuclear war. He presumes that the radiation won’t kill us,” Charles waved his hand at the children, “but it will kill non-mutants like her.” He then pointed at Moira. “So it’s up to us to stop him.”

Alex suddenly spoke up from his place at the counter. “Why us? And how would we even try to do that, Professor? You mentioned something about training when we left for this place, but I don’t see how anything we do here is gonna stop a guy like that.”

“He has Angel, too,” Sean said softly.

“We get to take on this threat because, as far as I’m concerned, mutants are the only ones with a chance of taking Shaw down. If he can absorb energy like you all have told me, then a nuclear blast won’t harm him at all. So, in order to subdue him, we have to fight fire with fire: mutant to mutant. It’s possible that even if we can’t overpower Shaw himself, we might be able to take down his entire support system, which would leave him at a standstill.”

Erik frowned into his coffee. He didn’t want to disarm Shaw; he wanted to kill him, no question. If they couldn’t come up with a way to do it collaboratively, Erik would simply have to go out on his own. He was invested in this little enterprise, sure, but leaving Shaw alive was not an option. He almost missed when Charles began talking again.

“As for _how_ we do this, we do exactly what you said, Alex: train. You all obviously know how to use your powers, but I believe that, with a little time and some hard work, we can hone them, focus them. For example, we can try and make it so that you, Alex, can send your energy toward a specific target, rather than let it run rampant and hope that it hits. Raven can practice holding onto a form during stress.” Raven scowled at the table and fingered a blonde curl. Interesting. Erik took a sip of his coffee. Raven’s powers seemed to be a point of contention between the siblings. “And I think, with a little help from Hank and the right equipment, we can make Sean fly.”

“Fly?” Sean piped up.

“Well, not exactly, but Hank and I have a theory that—”

“And what about you, Charles?” Raven cut in, her voice low. Her eyes flicked to back Erik for a moment before retreating to the tablecloth. “Are you going to practice hijacking our brains?”

The room fell silent in anticipation of his answer. No one knew much about Charles’s gifts, and frankly, no one much wanted to find out from first-hand experience. Having someone else control you from the inside was something Erik had never considered before meeting the man, but it was something that had been looming over his head ever since. It was bad enough that the man could (well, used to be able to) hear what he was thinking.

“I certainly have work to do as well,” Charles answered stiffly, “but nothing like that. No ‘hijacking,’ no rooting around in people’s innermost thoughts without _express permission_.” His voice had grown cold. “Just because you _can_ do something doesn’t mean you _should_.”

He had left Erik a perfect opening. “Can you do it, Charles? Take over someone’s mind?”

Charles met his gaze, his body rigid and his voice oddly cold. “I’ve never tried, nor do I intend to, but I suppose that yes, yes, I could.”

_Liar._ Erik took another drink. Charles didn’t seem to pick up on that thought either, or at least he gave no indication that he did.

“We also need to know what we’re up against,” Hank said as he removed the eggs from the stove and transferred them to a plate. “The CIA has his telepath in custody, so she’s no longer a threat, but what about the others?”

“There’s the teleporter,” Moira said softly. “The man with the red skin.”

“And the one who controls wind,” Erik added.

“Which could be a problem for Sean,” Charles remarked casually. He looked slightly dazed, as though his mind was far away from the conversation at hand. Erik’s fingers tightened around the handle of his mug.

“Me? Is this about that whole flying thing?”

Charles nodded, but the dazed look didn’t quite leave his face as he answered Sean. “As I was saying before, Hank and I have a theory that, with the proper equipment, you could use your powers as a propellant of sorts that would allow you to keep yourself aloft for small amounts of time. You could then glide to your intended destination.”

“It’s all theoretical, of course,” said Hank. “But I have the plans already drawn up. All I need to do is put everything together and have you test it.”

Sean shrunk down into himself. “I don’t think I like the sound of that.”

“You’ll do fine,” Erik cut in before turning to face Charles. “I need to talk to you. Privately.”

“Erik, I’m sure there’s nothing—”

“ _Now_ , Charles.” He stood and marched out of the room without waiting for an answer, leaving his half-drunk coffee on the table. 

“Guess I’d better see what’s wrong.” Raven caught his sleeve as he stood up to follow Erik.

“Charles. You’d tell us if something was wrong, right?”

He slid his hand over hers with a smile and removed himself from her grip. “Of course I would, love. Erik’s just in a bad mood over something I said to him last night. Don’t worry. Everything’s fine.”

\---

Erik found himself in one of the many sitting rooms scattered throughout the house. Light from the overlarge window brightened the heavy décor, and he could see the fine film of dust lining the walls. No one had been here in ages.

His eyes skated over to the two ugly armchairs seated beside the fireplace. They were just as ugly as the one in his room, if not more so, now that he had proper light to see by. Whomever had decorated this place certainly favored opulence over practicality. Erik wandered over to the window and leaned up against the sill as he looked out over the grounds. Everything was calm, quiet. Too quiet. It was making his skin crawl.

“Erik?” Charles knocked lightly on the wall to catch his attention. Erik could picture the light, disarming smile the he knew was painted across Charles’s face; it only made his irritation burrow deeper. He turned to face the other man, arms crossed defensively over his chest. Charles was smiling, just the way Erik imagined, clutching his half empty mug of coffee in his hands like a shield. “You wanted to speak to me?”

“Don’t play games with me, Charles.”

Charles’s shoulders dropped with a quiet sigh. Erik could see his fingers tighten around the mug. “I don’t know what you want me to say.”

“Anything!” Erik yelled. “I want you to stop pretending. Explain to me what happened last night.”

Charles lifted a hand and worriedly ran his fingers through his hair. “It’s nothing, Erik, really. I was—it was just a bit of trouble—”

“Trouble? I’d say it was more than just a _bit_ of trouble.” He narrowed his eyes and lowered his voice to barley above a whisper. “You told me your powers were gone. Is that true?”

Charles closed his eyes and sucked in a steadying breath; Erik prepared himself for more excuses, more diversions. “I was mistaken last night. It was a headache, nothing more. I used to get them all the time as a child.”

“You were _bleeding_ , Charles.”

“It happens,” Charles dismissed with a wave. “Nothing I can’t handle on my own in the future.”

Erik’s mind flashed back to all of the other times he’d caught Charles with ‘just a headache.’ The nosebleeds, the dizziness. Emma’s words to him on the flight back to the States.

_I know what’s wrong with your little telepath friend._

_He was sick long before I came along._

“Why bother coming to me at all, then?”

Charles fell silent at that, sinking back against the wall with his cup clenched tightly enough to bleed the color from his fingers. Erik sighed and scrubbed a hand over his face.

“Just…just read me. Or say something, telepathically. Anything. Prove to me that this isn’t just my imagination.”

Charles’s lips quirked up in a sardonic grin. “I thought you wanted me to stay out of your head.”

“I did. I do. But this is different.”

“How so?”

“Because I don’t know if I can trust you anymore if you can’t do this. You once told me you knew everything about me. Well, here’s your chance to prove it.”

Charles let his head slide back against the wall in defeat, and he closed his eyes. Gradually, like a whisper or a faint breeze, Erik felt something in his head. It was familiar and foreign all at once. Charles. The tension began to drain from his body. He watched as Charles slowly opened his eyes and looked up at the ceiling, focusing on nothing in particular.

“You’re upset with me,” he said, “but that’s obvious without looking at your mind. I guess I did look a sight last night—thank you for going and fetching me a shirt, by the way; it was a nice gesture. You want to know if I’ve turned human on you, which is silly because I’ve always been human.”

“We’re not like them, Charles. You know that.”

“That doesn’t change the fact that we’re human.” Charles finally looked at him then. His face had gone pale, and Erik could see his hands shaking. “I haven’t lost my abilities, Erik. I was just having a rough go of it last night.”

“And the other times?”

“Other times?”

“Your other headaches? This isn’t just about last night, Charles. It’s about all of it. You’ve been acting strange since began using Hank’s contraption and we started recruiting. Is it a side effect of Cerebro? What?”

Charles sighed and let his eyes fall shut again. “I don’t know, Erik.” Impatience was bleeding into his voice. “But I want this to stay between us.”

“What?”

“Keep the children and Moira out of this. I’m not…I can’t hear you as easily as I probably should. That is true.”

“You didn’t use your hand just now.” Charles shot Erik a confused look, and Erik motioned to the side of his head. “That finger thing you do. Would that make any difference?”

“Oh. I don’t need that. It’s more of a nervous habit than anything, I guess. It’s a signal. I started using it when Raven and I were children. It seemed to put her a bit more at ease when she knew for certain I was using my telepathy.” He looked down at the now cold coffee in his hands and sighed. “Just…trust me on this one, Erik. We have bigger things to worry about. I’ll be fine.”

Silence hung between them for a moment before Charles turned and walked out, probably headed back toward the kitchen. Erik looked back at the window, at the sweeping estate he could see beyond the glass. Charles hadn’t really said anything that wasn’t obvious. He was downplaying this, and it made unease twist in Erik’s gut.

“I can’t trust you if you can’t trust me, Charles,” he whispered to the air. Only silence was there to greet him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Life happens (excuses, excuses), and I'm so sorry for dropping off the face of the planet. I'm desperately trying to wrap up loose ends, and this story is one of them. It should hopefully be done in another two chapters or so.


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